Commentaries on Brand

 

Contents:

Kenan Malik's Spectator article,

Ian Brown's comments on it, plus reply

Vincent Egan on Christopher Brand and why he winds students up

 

An unintelligent debate

Kenan Malik

For a supposed debate about the nature of intelligence, the current row over
Edinburgh university don Chris Brand is singularly witless. Brand, a
psychologist, describes himself as a scientific racist and believes that
black people are innately less intelligent. His critics have called for his
sack and for his latest book, The g Factor, to be banned - a demand with which his publishers, John Wiley, have been happy to comply. It is an unedifying
spectacle - on the one side a bigoted academic, on the other civil
libertarians campaigning for censorship. It is a row which stirs together the
worst elements of contemporary society - bigotry, censorship, hypocrisy,
paranoia - and which reveals each side to be politically unsavoury and
intellectually shoddy.

Brand's case for the innate inferiority of blacks rests, like the argument of
Charles Murray and Richard Herrnstein in The Bell Curve, on the observation
that African-Americans consistently test 15 IQ points below their white
counterparts. The IQ gap between blacks and whites is well established and,
despite the claims of some antiracists, beyond dispute. But does it signify
that blacks are naturally less intelligent that whites or Asians? Only if,
like Brand, Murray and Herrnstein, we misunderstand the meaning of
intelligence and of race.

Brand holds that IQ tests measure a single mental entity, called g (for general intelligence), and that this entity is highly heritable. He further argues
that high g gives rise to socially desirable behaviours, while low g
correlates with social problems such as poverty, unemployment, idleness, and illegitimacy.

These are contentious claims. Ever since Frenchman Alfred Binet invented IQ
tests in 1905, there have been fierce debates as to what IQ measures, whether something as polymorphous as human intelligence can be captured by a single entity g, and whether g is anything more than a statistical artefact (for a
good discussion of this see Stephen J. Gould, The Mismeasure of Man, Penguin).

Brand dismisses this debate, claiming that intelligence is simply that which
most mental tests measure. But this is a tautology: IQ tests measure
intelligence, and intelligence is that which IQ tests measure. If g is, as
Brand claims, undefinable, then it becomes difficult to substantiate the
assertion that g is responsible for social success and racial differences.
And if Brand does not know what IQ tests measure, or what intelligence is, how can we evaluate the claim that lower IQ among blacks is an expression of lower intelligence?

Brand claims, without presenting any evidence, that 75% of individual
differences in IQ scores are due to genetic factors. There is, in fact, still
a considerable dispute about not just how much, but whether, IQ is heritable.
But suppose that IQ is highly heritable - would this show that blacks are
innately less intelligent than whites? No, because it is a basic rule of
genetics that you cannot compare differences within a group - in this case IQ
scores within the white or the black population - to differences between
groups - IQ differences between blacks and whites.

There is, however, considerable data to suggest that IQ scores are in fact not
fixed but plastic. Tests conducted by the American Army after the Second World War revealed that while black Southerners had a lower IQ than white
Southerners, black Southerners who had moved to Northern cities had a higher IQ than whites who had remained in the South. Other tests have similarly
suggested that changes in social conditions can often have a dramatic impact on IQ scores.

Such plasticity in IQ levels is perhaps most strikingly demonstrated by is
the so-called Flynn effect, named after James Flynn who discovered the
phenomenon. The Flynn effect describes the tendency for a secular rise in IQ
levels of about three points every decade. In other words, the average IQ
today is some 15 points higher than it was at the end of the Second World
War. Such a change can not be the work of genetic factors - the time scale is
too short for genes to have had any impact. The most likely explanation is
that rising IQ is the result of improved social and nutritional conditions.

Brand also fails to understand modern research on racial differences.
Throughout The g Factor Brand casually alludes to races as given entities and seems to think that blacks, whites and Asians can easily be
distinguished from each other. In ordinary life he would be right. But the
everyday idea of race has no place in a supposedly scientific investigation.

No serious biologist believes any more that humanity can be divided into
distinct races. In recent years geneticists have shown that there is far
greater genetic variation within what we consider to be a race, than there is
between races. They have shown too that the distribution of one gene (say that for skin colour) is independent of that for another (say for blood group). As
geneticist Steve Jones observes modern biology 'shows that there are no
separate groups within humanity (although there are noticeable differences
among the peoples of the world'.

In The Bell Curve, Murray and Herrnstein acknowledge that racial distinctions
are indeed blurred and ask, quite rightly: What does it mean to be black
in America, in racial terms, when the word black (or African American) can be
used for people whose ancestry is more European than African? How are we to classify a person who hails from Panama but whose ancestry is predominantly African? Their answer is to use self-assessment - allow people to decide
for themselves what race they are. But if the object of the exercise is to
investigate an objective relationship between race and intelligence, then using subjective criteria to define a race undermines the whole project from the
start.

Murray and Herrnstein at least acknowledge the problems in defining a race.
Brand does not even seem to realise that such a problem exists. He writes as if he is blind to the evidence of the past half-century of genetics research.

There has been one serious study of intelligence which has attempted to
resolve the problem of racial classification. Sandra Scarr and Richard
Weinberg compared IQ scores of African-American adolescents to blood proteins that indicated the proportion of their ancestry that was African and European.They found no relationship between the two. What this suggests is that the depressed IQ performance of African-Americans is related, not to their biological heritage, but to the social context of their lives in America.
Another study by Scarr and Weinberg which showed that black children in
Bermuda performed as well as, and sometimes better than, their white peers in the USA supports this interpretation. It is typical of Brand's selective
approach to the evidence that he should ignore these studies, while citing
other research by Scarr and Weinberg which he takes to be more favourable to his own position.

Far from establishing a link between race and intelligence, The g Factor
simply regurgitates old arguments long since discredited and is replete with
methodological flaws and scientific howlers. But is shoddy work and
unpalatable conclusions sufficient to ban a book and silence its author?
Brand's critics seem to think so. In their arguments for censorship, Brands
critics they show themselves to be as intellectually shallow as Brand himself.

The Scottish Council for Civil Liberties (an organisation which one naively
might have assumed would be hostile to censorship) called for The g Factor to be banned on the grounds that we would not expect any publisher to knowingly publish an inaccurate or false book. But how can we establish the
distinction between truth and falsehood without intellectual debate and
discussion? And what are universities for, if not to teach students how to
distinguish between fact and prejudice? It would be a sorry world in which
publishers (or university authorities), rather than readers, were responsible
for critically assessing books.

Jim Murphy, of the National Union of Students, suggested that freedom of
expression needs to be balanced against the right of black and Asian student
to be free from intimidation. This patronises black and Asian students,
treating them as weak victims unable to stand up for themselves. It also
diminishes the true horror of racism. Most black students have grown up with
prejudice and are well prepared for it. Having burning rags stuffed through
your letter box is a frightening and intimidating experience. Listening to
psychology lecture - however racist the lecturer may be - is not.

The call for censorship of racist material is not just wrong in principle. It
is, as Marek Kohn points out, wrong in practice too. "I believe not
only that you can be both against racism and for free expression," argues
Kohn, whose book The Race Gallery is an expose of contemporary racial science, "but that the only way to counter scientific and related forms of racism is through free expression." Kohn is right. Those who wish to censor The g
Factor seem to believe that such ideas can be kept in check if we do not
acknowledge their existence. In fact the opposite is the case. So long as we
are not confident enough openly to confront racist ideas, they will fester.
Racism cannot be wished away; it must be rooted out and confronted at every
turn. Antiracists today, however, seem so unsure about their own capacity for
reasoned argument that they would rather censor an argument than confront it.

Ultimately censorship could prove far more dangerous than the views of a
self-avowed racist like Brand. Most of us have a reflex aversion to racism.
Scientific racists are not exactly thick on the ground, and Brand's ideas have
little purchase, even within his own academic discipline. Censorship, on the
other hand, is more insidious. It is often introduced, as in the Brand case,
under the guise of protecting society from an evil such as racism or
antisemitism. The motive may be well-intentioned, but the consequences can only be disastrous. Such censorship will ensure that racism will continue to
fester unchecked, while at the same times our lives become more regulated and unfree.

Kenan Malik is the author of The Meaning of Race: Race, History and Culture in Western Society (Macmillan).

This article first appeared in The Spectator, 11 May 1996.


Ian Brown writes:


Your 'Race Gallery' site is very interesting, and I especially agree with your
anti-censorship stand. Having read the above commentary by Malik and also the book itself, I thought I would just point out one small inaccuracy in Malik's review. He says that "Brand... (claims) that intelligence is simply that which most mental tests measure." He doesn't. His position is that "g is directly related to speed of perceptual intake". The "intelligence is what intelligence tests measure" position is one of the positions Brand expressly tries to disprove. Therefore, "If g is, as Brand claims, undefinable..." and "if Brand does not know what IQ tests measure, or what intelligence is..." are both inaccurate statements.

Ian Brown is "currently investigating the use of the World Wide Web in computer-aided learning". And that's just what we're here for ...


Kenan Malik replies:

I have some sympathy with Ian Brown's argument: Brand's assertions are so
contradictory that their logic is often difficult to make out. However, a
careful reading of The g-Factor will bear out my argument.

Brand begins by suggesting that it is difficult to decide on a useful definition for intelligence:

'On encountering such questions, it is tempting to begin to address them by
adopting some "definition". How, after all, can scientists measure
intelligence if "no one knows what it really is"? Thus a search for scholarly
and at least half-adequate definitions begins. Attempted definitions of
intelligence might include such classics as "reasoning ability", "learning
ability", "the education of relations and correlates", "general cognitive
resources" or even... "the application of information to situation" or
"organism-environment correspondence"...However, the problem is that any
definition that manages to be more engaging than what can be found in a
dictionary turns out to be unacceptable to someone or another.' [p11]

He then goes on to suggest that g can be negatively correlated with inspection time (IT), which provides a rough measure of the speed of apprehension of
information under certain circumstances. Note that this is not a definition of
intelligence, but simply a purported relationship between intelligence, as
measured by IQ, and speed of perceptual intake. However, this correlation
between IQ test scores and IT test scores leads Brand to claim that g 'need
no longer be considered merely as "what intelligence tests test" ' [p77]. Not
so.

Brand's argument runs as follows: IQ measures g; IQ negatively correlates with IT; therefore IT is a negative measure of g; therefore g is more than simply
the result of IQ tests. Leaving aside the whole question of whether IQ does
measure g, and whether such a polymorphous entity as intelligence can be
reduced to a form of reaction time, Brand's argument still rests on g as
being that which is measured by IQ tests. All he has done is introduced a new test (IT), the results of which correlate with the old test (IQ). At best he
has replaced the claim that intelligence 'is what mental tests measure' with
the claim that 'intelligence is what IT tests measure'.

Indeed, Brand himself returns later in the book to his original definition of
intelligence:

'Like these concepts [electricity and gravity], g has a clear definition
within its own field, psychometric psychology, as "that which most mental
tests measure"... The layperson's inability to say much about electricity and
gravity may express many attitudes to science... but it does not constitute a
challenge to the causal force of these variables. To withhold causal status
from g because it is "undefined" is not to do battle but only to opt out of
the argument...' [p149]


Another comment from Ian Brown:

Malik says "Brand claims, without presenting any evidence, that 75% of
individual differences in IQ scores are due to genetic factors." In "Intelligence:
Knowns and Unknowns" (in American Psychologist, February (I think)
1996), the conclusion drawn is that "heritability [of IQ] rises from .55
in childhood to .75 in adolescence [due to childrens' genes expressing
themselves better as the influence of their parents lessens].
Between-family effects fall to 0."

This paper was written by a task-force chosen by the American Psychological Assocation, in order to provide a base upon which everyone can agree, to help inform further debate. The taskforce included several IQ 'sceptics', but the contents of the paper were agreed unanimously. I think the (quite high)
heritability of IQ is relatively well accepted now.




Vincent Egan writes, from the University of Leicester:

As an ex-PhD student of Chris Brand I am in a stronger position than many to comment on his work than the undergraduates of Edinburgh University. I left his supervision in 1991, and Edinburgh in 1993, and thus have some distance from the affair. Having edited an earlier draft, you might say that I am responsible for ensuring that The g Factor (TgF) had the controversial bits removed!

My own work is (slightly incorrectly and selectively) cited in 'TgF'; I have also published on brain size and IQ. However I see the latter in neuropsychological terms, and did the study (Egan et al, 'Size isn't everything...', PAID, 1994, with an additional correction in PAID, 1995) because we wanted to see whether the association replicated. If I am a racist, I am one of the almost-vegetarian, Amnesty International supporting, Labour-voting ones who believe countries
only become interesting once they are multi-cultural.

Chris is not a racist, he is elitist. He welcomes people of any hue, sex, orientation or class, provided they are intelligent. This is not so different from the academics and book-reading classes who oppose him (you don't generally find such people associating with non-intellectual types). In my time in Edinburgh, I knew him to regularly entertain people from Ghana and Central Africa (and elsewhere), and welcomed their company. In his interactions with them he was unpatronising (which is very refreshing for African students at academic parties).

Chris welcomes debate about intelligence provided people argue using scientific evidence, and also argues with his own colleagues. He is critical of Phil Rushton's work (see his book review of 'Race, Evolution, and Behavior' in PAID last year), dismisses the brain volume results as a case of publication bias, and pooh-poohs most of the reaction time and AEP work associated with IQ. He is equally critical of the more considered IT research now forthcoming from Edinburgh University. Thus Chris is as hard on his own area as he is of critics: perhaps harder. This is precisely what one might want of an academic.
Due to his monomania for g, his highly developed sense of criticism and his fogeyish affectations, Chris can be an exasperating person to work with - particularly if you have to be as intimate as a post-graduate student must be. Chris responds to intelligent criticism, and his fogeydom conceals surprisingly youthful cultural interests. Alarmingly for the most differential psychologists (and even worse for the more dynamically-oriented ones), he is a born-again
Freudian. Arguing with him necessitates you knowing the relevant literature and seeing the holes (which he is all too aware of). His lectures and reading lists make these available foranyone able to cross George Square, enter the library, and read. Not all students are willing to make this jump into challenging their preconceptions.

In 1986 the student complaints about his racism and sexism reflected that 4th year's belated discovery of posturing leftism, deconstruction, Wittgenstein, Foucault, Fanon and feminist psycho-analysis. Their disappointment that, notwithstanding social psychology, academic psychology did not cover these topics, was directed at Chris (although their anti-'scientism' was pervasive to the entire course). The social context is important; in the Spring of 1986
Thatcherism was dominant, and Scotland (and especially its students) wanted to hit at England. Chris Brand's Oxford-donnish affectations (and his pro-Maggie teasing) did not endear him to local students any more than his off-the-cuff remarks. Rather than argue with the content of his primary sources or laugh at him (the preferred strategies of the better students), some tried to
challenge him on what would now be considered PC-grounds. They failed. However, Chris's disengenuous comments to the Independent on Sunday in April (and thereafter all over) brought the furore back to the surface. He is now the subject of a University enquiry for his impious attitudes.

Chris's personality and attitudes are less extreme than the caricature he presents or is portrayed as; they are often there to goad inactive students into thinking. Unfortunately, people will do anything to avoid thinking for themselves: even, sadly, Honours degree students in Psychology. His book has now been withdrawn, an act of commercial stupidity by Wiley (who, given the book's controversy would have sold far more copies than they would have otherwise
anticipated), and an act of intellectual cowardice: are Chris's arguments so strong they cannot be challenged or, even, given modern student interests, 'deconstructed'? A review of TgF by Professor Pat Rabbitt in a widely-read academic journal would be worth a dozen Anti Nazi League 'Ban Brand' meetings. A reading of TgF would summarise all the holes in recent intelligence research for those critical of the topic. Publishing the book would enable the world to express their indifference (or otherwise) at another academic tome solving the problems of the world, rather than empower it with a persuasive and subversive power it may not justify.


The papers Vincent Egan mentions above are directly relevant to discussions in The Race Gallery. The full references are:

Vincent Egan et al, 'Size Isn't Everything: A Study of Brain Volume, Intelligence and Auditory Evoked Potentials', Personality & Individual Differences 17(3), 1994, 357-367.

Vincent Egan, John C. Wickett, Philip A. Vernon, 'Brain Size and intelligence: erratum, addendum, and correction', Personality & Individual Differences 19(1), 1995, 113-5.

Christopher Brand, 'What is it to be high-K?', Personality & Individual Differences 19(3), 1995, 411-3.

Vincent Egan has also published on the IT question, which Kenan Malik and Ian Brown discuss above. See

'Intelligence, inspection time and cognitive strategies', British Journal of Psychology 85, 1994, 305-315.

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