What evidence is there that race and ethnicity are biological (e.g. determined by genetics) and not social constructs?

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[–]FoxySDTWhite Nationalist 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (5 children)

I'm also aware that Lynn wrote a counter rebuttal but I'm not sure who to trust. Is one side lying? Even though Wicherts stated 76 is a more reasonable number and not 66?

Wicherts thinks it's 82. The 76 number is only if you go by Raven's matrices IIRC. And Lynn recently updated his figure for Africa from 67 to 71 in his 2015 book on race and IQ. Largely thanks to Becker's dataset. l personally think it's somewhere in low 70s. That number is obtained by both IQ tests and international tests. Here is a good write up on that https://thealternativehypothesis.org/index.php/2016/04/15/iq-of-sub-saharan-africa/

Even without going into the specifics of his method, does this not fall under two fallacies: confirmation bias and correlation does not imply causation? Again, I've never heard of scientists going into North Korea and returning back with IQ Tests, without passing Communist censorship. I would apply this example for other dictatorships as well. Cuba, Turkmenistan, hell, even Equatorial Guinea that was in the original example can be defined as this.

North Korean IQ was used one and only time in Lynn's 2012 book and the source he give for that is CIA's The World Factbook 2011. So it was probably their estimate of education that he converted to IQ scores.

Rather than geography being an explanation, his method is actually proof of history and social standing are bigger factors? For example, Europe in general is pretty rich, has good healthcare and access to education, so it's not a surprise they all cluster together.

This is largely irrelevant. We were discussing whether estimating IQ of nations by its neighbors is a valid method. And we apparently agree. But whether it is because they are ethnically similar or they have similar social standing is beyond the point. And I don't want to get into THAT debate here.

PISA goes back to the example of Communist/Dictatorship nations rigging their tests for propaganda points. If Lynn is using that as proof or a correlation, it once again, seems flawed.

https://ncee.org/2020/01/are-chinas-pisa-scores-believable-a-different-view/

We have IQ tests from China as well and they actually got higher result than PISA (104 vs 103). We also have data from Taiwan and Hong Kong which are basically capitalist mini Chinas and they both got higher score than China (106 and 105 vs 104). If Chinese government is lying they're not very good at it.

In fact, maybe it's not just China to blame. PISA has been criticized for measuring economic success, not education.

https://theconversation.com/problems-with-pisa-why-canadians-should-be-skeptical-of-the-global-test-118096

Holy fuck this article is something else.

"PISA measures math, science and reading skills, not more holistic educational goals or understanding of literacy as defined by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). ... PISA ignores the importance of engagement and positive attitudes to learning for future success. .... Educational outcomes that are important for future citizens or a well-rounded education are not captured: for example, democratic participation, understanding of history and politics, teamwork, well-being, moral values, creativity, aesthetic skills, athletic talent or communication skills. "

How could anyone wrote this with a straight face? This is like the Simpsons episode where in girl math classes they are discussing feelings about numbers.

"Even though PISA use is spreading globally, and is translated into national languages, it is still framed by Western understandings and may distort results from students with diverse social and cultural histories."

Why are Asians scoring higher than Westerns then?

"There is a co-relation between poverty and lower test results: the OECD notes that up to 46 per cent of the differences in PISA mathematics scores among OECD countries can be explained by socio-economic disadvantage."

Yes, there is correlation so what? They don't know the direction of causality. Might as well be that PISA scores explain 46% of gap in SES disadvantage. This is closer to the truth since controlling for GDP per capita narrows the IQ gap between white and black countries only by 4 IQ points. https://thealternativehypothesis.org/index.php/2016/04/15/race-iq-and-poverty/

PISA is a very good measure of education as well as IQ. All these educational tests PISA includes are all components of intelligence. That's why there is 0.907 correlation between PISA and IQ scores. Just like there is high correlation between IQ and GPA within nations. Or between IQ and SAT. If PISA isn't good measure of education nothing else is either.

[–]radicalcentristNational Centrism 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

Wicherts thinks it's 82. The 76 number is only if you go by Raven's matrices IIRC. And Lynn recently updated his figure for Africa from 67 to 71 in his 2015 book on race and IQ. Largely thanks to Becker's dataset. l personally think it's somewhere in low 70s. That number is obtained by both IQ tests and international tests. Here is a good write up on that https://thealternativehypothesis.org/index.php/2016/04/15/iq-of-sub-saharan-africa/

If I'm reading that chart correctly, Alt-Hype is using international test scores that are as old as 1984 (despite publishing that article in 2016). He also admits that a lot of African countries have missing data and that South Africa is more heavily weighted in this chart (which is more multicultural compared to its neighbors). The rest of the article both try and make their arguments for some kind of geographical average, but this is disingenuous. Is it really fair to stereotype all of Africa being the same despite examples of Botswana, Ghana and even Rwanda have rising standards of living over time? It's believable that a low IQ nation exists, but it's not so static that these numbers from the 1980s are suppose to be representative of today's world. In fact, there has been a follow up study done in Kenya, that showed they have gained significant IQ points from 1984 ~ 1998.

... Daley, Whaley, Sigman, Espinosa, and Neumann (2003) found an IQ gain of 19 points per decade over 14 years (between 1984 and 1998) in rural Kenya children. The authors considered mother's education, family structure, and children's nutrition and health as possible explanations for this intriguingly large gain (Daley et al., 2003).

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/349749784_The_role_of_short-term_changes_in_cognitive_capacity_on_economic_expenditure_among_Kenyan_agro-pastoralists

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/10764139_IQ_on_the_Rise_The_Flynn_Effect_in_Rural_Kenyan_Children

This is largely irrelevant. We were discussing whether estimating IQ of nations by its neighbors is a valid method. And we apparently agree.

In context only. I expect wealthy nations to be similar, but also if we can actually prove it. Europe nearly 30 years ago, was still under the Iron Curtain. Writing in Capitalist German IQ scores for that of the Socialist Germans despite bordering each other would have been inaccurate. And strangely enough, Lynn would agree with me here since he was involved in this project.

https://reason.com/2012/08/07/nations-smart-rich-wealth-creation/

Let's look at Germany. Lynn and Vanhanen cited four studies that found that West German IQ scores ranged from 99 to 107, whereas East German IQs were as low as 90 back in 1967, and later studies pegged their scores at 97 to 99 points. Taking the extremes, these data imply a gap as big as 17 IQ points between West and East Germans. How to account for the rise East Germany in less than a generation of 7 to 9 points? After all, East and West Germans are not all that genetically different. Lynn's data now show an average German IQ of 102 points

So I'm not in favor of using correlation to mean causation with geography without knowing what the nation's background is. Even when you look at Asia too, a similar problem exists. China is massive and it borders India, which also borders Myanmar, who then borders Thailand/Vietnam/Philippines. And the numbers are all over the place (105, 82, 90, 86)?

We have IQ tests from China as well and they actually got higher result than PISA (104 vs 103). We also have data from Taiwan and Hong Kong which are basically capitalist mini Chinas and they both got higher score than China (106 and 105 vs 104). If Chinese government is lying they're not very good at it.

You have to give me a good reason why should I ever take China's word seriously, when this is the same country that just let a virus infect the entire earth, but today they claim their own country is virus free? It's an unfortunate example since I don't doubt there are a lot smart Chinese people (just by virtue of having the biggest population on Earth), but at the same time, being a dictatorship, they are expected to behave and act a certain way that meets State expectations since the punishments for not doing so is jail time, "disappearances" or even death. For example, a 2011 study found that plagiarism and cheating is rampant in Chinese students applying for schooling in the U.S. At least 90% of them were viewed this way. https://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/06/education/edlife/the-china-conundrum.html?pagewanted=all

Zinch China, a consulting company that advises American colleges and universities about China, last year published a report based on interviews with 250 Beijing high school students bound for the United States, their parents, and a dozen agents and admissions consultants. The company concluded that 90 percent of Chinese applicants submit false recommendations, 70 percent have other people write their personal essays, 50 percent have forged high school transcripts and 10 percent list academic awards and other achievements they did not receive. The “tide of application fraud,” the report predicted, will likely only worsen as more students go to America.

How could anyone wrote this with a straight face? This is like the Simpsons episode where in girl math classes they are discussing feelings about numbers.

To be honest, the article does raise one good point that often isn't taken into consideration. Although it's more related to IQ Testing than PISA, but how well a student is motivated can certainly affect test scores.

https://www.nih.gov/news-events/nih-research-matters/motivation-may-influence-iq-scores

In one part of the study, the scientists reviewed 46 previous experiments that examined how financial incentives affect IQ scores. The analysis included data on more than 2,000 test-takers, mostly between the ages of 6 and 18. The scientists found that material rewards, such as money, boosted IQ scores noticeably, by about 2/3 of a standard deviation (SD), or about 10 IQ points. The effect was greatest for people who started out with lower scores. Those with an initial score below 100 showed an increase of nearly 1 SD, or about 15 IQ points. In the second part of the study, the researchers analyzed data from the Pittsburgh Youth Study, which followed 250 boys from adolescence to early adulthood. The boys were videotaped around age 12 while taking an IQ test. Each student’s level of motivation was rated by 3 trained observers, who reviewed 20 minutes of footage and looked for behaviors that might indicate attentiveness or lack of interest in the test. The scientists found that the students’ IQ scores accurately predicted later outcomes in life, including academic performance in adolescence, criminal convictions, employment and years of education in early adulthood. However, when the researchers corrected for the influence of test motivation, the predictive power of the IQ scores dropped substantially, especially for non-academic outcomes.

This is not to discredit any test or say they're worthless. But I can see an argument to be made that certain mood levels and incentivized rewards could play a role in how people attain their best performance.

By the way, this is a good discussion. Don't feel like I'm pressuring you or trying to make you look bad. This is the type of debates I'm interested in that carefully weights evidence on both sides to reach a higher level of understanding.

[–]FoxySDTWhite Nationalist 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

If I'm reading that chart correctly, Alt-Hype is using international test scores that are as old as 1984 (despite publishing that article in 2016). He also admits that a lot of African countries have missing data and that South Africa is more heavily weighted in this chart (which is more multicultural compared to its neighbors). The rest of the article both try and make their arguments for some kind of geographical average, but this is disingenuous. Is it really fair to stereotype all of Africa being the same despite examples of Botswana, Ghana and even Rwanda have rising standards of living over time?

You can compare the test results from recent years in the article. There is really no increase over time. Here are PISA and TIMSS results for Africa from post-2000. Still, low as always.

It's believable that a low IQ nation exists, but it's not so static that these numbers from the 1980s are suppose to be representative of today's world. In fact, there has been a follow up study done in Kenya, that showed they have gained significant IQ points from 1984 ~ 1998.

Daley, Whaley, Sigman, Espinosa, and Neumann (2003) found an IQ gain of 19 points per decade over 14 years (between 1984 and 1998) in rural Kenya children. The authors considered mother's education, family structure, and children's nutrition and health as possible explanations for this intriguingly large gain (Daley et al., 2003).

I'm aware of this study. Here are some others from Kenya: https://i.ibb.co/4KkmpFv/obr-zok.png. In the context of all other studies from Kenya, the 87 figure is clearly a fluke. Also, IQ of blacks in the US is 85 so it's hard to imagine how third world population would have higher IQ than the first world one. The only way you can argue for this number is to ignore the rest and say that environment has no effect whatsoever.

In context only. I expect wealthy nations to be similar, but also if we can actually prove it. Europe nearly 30 years ago, was still under the Iron Curtain. Writing in Capitalist German IQ scores for that of the Socialist Germans despite bordering each other would have been inaccurate. And strangely enough, Lynn would agree with me here since he was involved in this project.

https://reason.com/2012/08/07/nations-smart-rich-wealth-creation/

Let's look at Germany. Lynn and Vanhanen cited four studies that found that West German IQ scores ranged from 99 to 107, whereas East German IQs were as low as 90 back in 1967, and later studies pegged their scores at 97 to 99 points. Taking the extremes, these data imply a gap as big as 17 IQ points between West and East Germans. How to account for the rise East Germany in less than a generation of 7 to 9 points? After all, East and West Germans are not all that genetically different. Lynn's data now show an average German IQ of 102 points

Okay so, the 107 number is from Buj (1981) who has been criticized by Rinderman for having results inconsistent with other IQ studies as well as having standard deviations all over the place. Lynn defended him though I would take his numbers with a grain of salt. Amren links quite a few replies to that article. Vdare article points out several counter-exmaples to Unz, Peter Frost attributes it to truancy.

"If I could rewrite this text, I would point out more clearly that the IQ difference between West Germany and East Germany probably reflected differences in truancy. The more leniently a school treats absenteeism the higher it will score on IQ tests, since the truants tend to be problem students. But the higher IQ score is illusory. ... Who were those truants? Some had legitimate excuses, but most were problem students who were "playing hookey." So right there you have a serious source of bias. The more a school allows absenteeism, the higher its IQ scores will be. This is the main reason why IQ scores were lower in East Germany than in West Germany. DDR youth were terrified of being sent to a juvenile detention center."

I looked at other post-Soviet nations in Lynn's dataset that had IQ tests taken one during socialism one during capitalism to see if transition to free market had any impact. Most of them had no change. Bulgaria - 94 in 1981 and 91 in 1998. Czechia - 100 in 1972 and 96 in 1995. Poland, funnily enough, had decrease from 106 to 92 between 1981 and 1991. Again the Buj study. Slovakia - 97 in 1963 and 100 in 2000. Hungary - 98 in 1981 and 100 in 2011. And so on and so on.

This is just Unz cherry-picking as he does. Most of countries IQs clustered together and had no change in either direction. For countries with two or more IQs, the correlation between the two extreme numbers was 0.93.

You have to give me a good reason why should I ever take China's word seriously

This is the best that I can do I'm afraid. The last paragraph showed that having socialist economy does not depress national IQ so you can go by data from Taiwan and Hong Kong an safely assume that China's IQ would be about the same.

This is not to discredit any test or say they're worthless. But I can see an argument to be made that certain mood levels and incentivized rewards could play a role in how people attain their best performance.

For that argument to be more than a speculation you would have to show that different groups have different levels of motivation. IQ predicts life outcomes equally well for everyone so there isn't bias of any sort on IQ tests.

[–]radicalcentristNational Centrism 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

You can compare the test results from recent years in the article. There is really no increase over time. Here are PISA and TIMSS results for Africa from post-2000. Still, low as always

Don't take this as a cop-out, but I do have some explanations for this.

  1. Brain drain.

It's a catch-22 cycle. For anyone with above average IQ and wants to escape poverty, why choose to stay behind as opposed to moving somewhere else? I'm aware though this argument could be used for every continent. So how can I prove this disproportionately effects Africa? Fortunately enough, I did find an article covering emigration trends in Africa, and a majority of respondents said they would rather leave their country then stay. The number was as high as 75% for Nigerians, and 43% at the lowest for Tanzanians. https://www.pewresearch.org/global/2018/03/22/at-least-a-million-sub-saharan-africans-moved-to-europe-since-2010/

In fact, maybe this argument might gain traction. From the same article, it says 6% of Ghana's entire population had applied for a lottery that grants them the chance to move to the U.S. The only requirements was internet access, and having a highschool diploma.

For example, 1.7 million Ghanaians (or 6% of Ghana’s population) applied for the U.S. diversity lottery in 2015, even when only 50,000 people worldwide are permitted to move each year to the U.S. through this visa program. In the same year, other sub-Saharan African countries, such as the Republic of Congo (10%), Liberia (8%) and Sierra Leone (8%) saw high shares of their populations apply for the lottery. Although the lottery only requires an online application and the completion of a high school diploma for eligibility, the high number of applicants underscores the seriousness with which many sub-Saharan Africans contemplate and actively pursue migrating abroad.

  1. Corruption & Ongoing War

Even in the last 30 years, Africa's continent has been hit by some devastating civil wars and tribalism. While this might sound like an argument that it's a self perpetuating cycle from Low IQ, it's fair to point out that foreign intervention and decolonization did do a lot of damage in destabilizing the continent. Without a proper functioning government that actually works for the people and not a dictator/foreign interests, life in Africa becomes more about survival rather than having the means to actually get an education or go to school safely.

So without sounding like a complete Liberal and whining about colonization, how can I actually prove that a stable Africa will result in better test results? I'll use the country of Botswana as proof of this.

I found a study that actually points out Botswana, despite being one of the richest African countries, has children failing 1+1 math problems. And while this failure might sound genetic at first, the government actually took on an entirely new education system, and completely reversed those depressing test scores.

https://www.brookings.edu/blog/education-plus-development/2019/10/31/taking-education-back-to-the-basics-at-scale-in-botswana/

In 2018, Botswana’s Ministry of Basic Education (MoBE) signed a 4-year Memorandum of Understanding with Young 1ove to scale TaRL in three regions and develop a plan for national scale. Since then, Young 1ove, in partnership with MoBE, the Ministry of Youth Empowerment, Sport, and Culture Development, and UNICEF, has piloted and implemented TaRL in 10 percent of schools across Botswana. Early results from these efforts are promising. The most recent results from the last round of implementation reveal that over 82 percent of participating students gained numeracy skills, the percentage of students who can do division jumped from 12 percent to 76 percent, and the percentage of innumerate students dropped from 13 percent to 1 percent after 30 hours of TaRL instruction.

I'll admit though, this is just one sample size, since Africa has numerous countries. But even for me, this was the first time I learned of such a program that did succeed in bringing literacy and numeracy to the masses.

I'm aware of this study. Here are some others from Kenya: https://i.ibb.co/4KkmpFv/obr-zok.png PNG . In the context of all other studies from Kenya, the 87 figure is clearly a fluke. Also, IQ of blacks in the US is 85 so it's hard to imagine how third world population would have higher IQ than the first world one. The only way you can argue for this number is to ignore the rest and say that environment has no effect whatsoever.

America is a very diverse country, that different regions have their own IQ patterns. The same can be said within races. West Virginia (the poorest White State) has an average IQ of 98. Whereas rich ones like Massachusetts is higher at 104.

https://www.inc.com/bill-murphy-jr/we-compared-average-iq-score-in-all-50-states-results-are-eye-opening.html

Now I will admit I do have to look for data that compares black test scores by region but in the mean time, I do recall seeing another study from 2 years ago that showed statistical noise in intelligence based on whether blacks identified with their European/mixed race heritage or not.

https://twitter.com/KirkegaardEmil/status/1296837437923172353

Edit: I'm not sure why it keeps linking to the Brazil map first. But scroll down and you'll find the chart with the U.S black/european noise.

I looked at other post-Soviet nations in Lynn's dataset that had IQ tests taken one during socialism one during capitalism to see if transition to free market had any impact. Most of them had no change. Bulgaria - 94 in 1981 and 91 in 1998. Czechia - 100 in 1972 and 96 in 1995. Poland, funnily enough, had decrease from 106 to 92 between 1981 and 1991. Again the Buj study. Slovakia - 97 in 1963 and 100 in 2000. Hungary - 98 in 1981 and 100 in 2011. And so on and so on. This is just Unz cherry-picking as he does. Most of countries IQs clustered together and had no change in either direction. For countries with two or more IQs, the correlation between the two extreme numbers was 0.93.

Hmmm, doesn't this scenario present a contradiction with how IQ data is actually collected? Numbers that go up or down after the collapse, even though it's known that the Soviet Union always had food production problems? Or how about a few decades prior, when IQ testing was used for Europeans who immigrated to the U.S but somehow scored lower?

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/230435620_Intelligence_Tests_and_Immigration_to_the_United_States_1900-1940

This is the best that I can do I'm afraid. The last paragraph showed that having socialist economy does not depress national IQ so you can go by data from Taiwan and Hong Kong an safely assume that China's IQ would be about the same.

China has more nations that border it to the South, that according to the IQ map, are still in the 82 ~ 94 range. I can't think of a reason to pick one over the other, especially as Vietnam is a Socialist nation, but is considered behind the rest.

For that argument to be more than a speculation you would have to show that different groups have different levels of motivation. IQ predicts life outcomes equally well for everyone so there isn't bias of any sort on IQ tests.

Surprisingly, I've just come across a variety of articles on this subject, but the outcomes are all over the place. For example, one study says poor Black success is not from a lack of trying, but it then goes on to say the U.S education system in general is behind several other nations.

https://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2526&context=doctoral

While African Americans lag behind their European American counterparts, American students also lag behind other students worldwide. Globally, students in United States rank 62nd in math proficiency and 17th in reading proficiency (Peterson, Woessmann, Hanushek & LastraAnadon, 2011). According to Peterson et al. (2011), the U.S reading proficiency rate is 31%, compared to other countries such as Korea (47%), Singapore and New Zealand (42%), Japan and Canada (41%), Australia (38%) and Belgium (37%). These numbers indicate a larger problem with academic achievement in the United States. Students sit in the same classes, learning the same curriculum from the same teacher, and yet disparities in achievement are evident. To give all students the education they deserve, it is important to determine what factors contribute to these disparities.

Another study has the motivation levels in complete reverse. There was a positive relation with GPA scores and motivation, but it was only for the majority [white?] students.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10459-018-9840-3

In this study, autonomous motivation had a positive association with GPA through achieving strategy for the ethnic majority students only. It might be that the size of the minority groups was too small to detect differences or that other factors mediate these relations in ethnic minority students. Qualitative research is needed to identify other factors influencing the academic performance of ethnic minority students and what they experience during their education, in order to support their learning in the right manner.

Again, I've found many articles on this. I don't know where it starts, and it where it possibly ends.

[–]FoxySDTWhite Nationalist 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

Brain drain.

If all smart people moved out of Africa and that's why its IQ remains so low then there would have to be tens of millions of smart Africans all over the world. Which I very much doubt. The only thing that comes to mind are Nigerians in the US and there is not so many of them there that it would affect Nigerians IQ in significant way. Also, Black immigrants to the US are pretty low educated so there is not much of a brain drain going on at all. https://i.ibb.co/Kry5rgw/obr-zok.png

I found a study that actually points out Botswana, despite being one of the richest African countries, has children failing 1+1 math problems. And while this failure might sound genetic at first, the government actually took on an entirely new education system, and completely reversed those depressing test scores.

These are probably tests only for Botswana, this is not useful when making national comparisons. That article is pretty vague that it is almost meaningless like "gained numeracy skills", "percentage of students who can do division". wtf does that mean? Kids in other countries can do divisions too, the question is how well those kids divisions compared to each other. This is where international testing comes and Botswana is not doing very well on those. https://i.ibb.co/CnF192D/obr-zok.png

Hmmm, doesn't this scenario present a contradiction with how IQ data is actually collected? Numbers that go up or down after the collapse, even though it's known that the Soviet Union always had food production problems? Or how about a few decades prior, when IQ testing was used for Europeans who immigrated to the U.S but somehow scored lower?

I wouldn't dwell to much on those numbers. Polish IQ certainly didn't go down one standard deviation within 10 years. These are mostly measurement errors.

China has more nations that border it to the South, that according to the IQ map, are still in the 82 ~ 94 range. I can't think of a reason to pick one over the other, especially as Vietnam is a Socialist nation, but is considered behind the rest.

I picked Taiwan and Hong Kong because they are both >90% Han Chinese, not because they are neighboring countries. That's why I called them mini Chinas

[–]radicalcentristNational Centrism 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

If all smart people moved out of Africa and that's why its IQ remains so low then there would have to be tens of millions of smart Africans all over the world. Which I very much doubt. The only thing that comes to mind are Nigerians in the US and there is not so many of them there that it would affect Nigerians IQ in significant way. Also, Black immigrants to the US are pretty low educated so there is not much of a brain drain going on at all. https://i.ibb.co/Kry5rgw/obr-zok.png PNG

There could be a macro effect going on. For example, there already exists a doctor shortage in Nigeria. It could be argued crumbling health infrastructure will negatively effect socio-economic development.

https://digitalcommons.uri.edu/srhonorsprog/164/#:~:text=The%20loss%20of%20Africa's%20intellectual,the%20development%20of%20the%20continent.&text=As%20the%20most%20populated%20country,especially%20in%20the%20United%20States.

The purpose of this research is to understand the cause of the Nigerian brain-drain, the socio-economic impact, and ways to reverse the effects of the brain drain, thereby creating a brain-gain. The study is based on literary reviews and my surveys and interviews of Nigerians between the ages of 18-45, which indicates that the Nigerian brain-drain is a product of both “internal” and “external” factors working simultaneously to push Nigerians out of their country and pull them into developed nations respectively. Subsequently, skilled and educated Nigerians are attracted to the Western’s economic opportunities and what they believe to be an easy way of life. However, the brain-drain problem arises when Africans choose not to return to their native country. The data also suggests that Nigerians living abroad do not want to return back mainly due to the lack of an environment conducive for professional growth. In addition to this setback, political instability infused with corruption, and the frustration of dealing with the average Nigerian’s tolerance of corruption and greed discourages people from returning. Thus, the brain-drain continues to increase with 23,000 professionals leaving Africa annually as estimated by the World Bank report in 2007.

Same problem with the engineers who leave. Who will actually stick around to build new roads and schools, which is necessary to bring the poor rural community to the more rich and prosperous urban centers?

These are probably tests only for Botswana, this is not useful when making national comparisons. That article is pretty vague that it is almost meaningless like "gained numeracy skills", "percentage of students who can do division". wtf does that mean? Kids in other countries can do divisions too, the question is how well those kids divisions compared to each other. This is where international testing comes and Botswana is not doing very well on those.

Unfortunately, data comparing math skills is still hard to come by with these third world nations. To their credit, their government has at least succeeded in bringing literacy rate above the sub-saharan average (86% vs 64%). It seems there are other factors within their politics that is disrupting progress. For example, I found a nice article that at least tried to compare South Korea's education system with that of Botswana, and it points out many mistakes that Botswana's need to learn from. Such as: paying teachers more, addressing class overcrowding, giving schools more power over their budgets.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/336460408_Botswana's_Education_System_A_Relative_Analysis_with_South_Korean_Education_System

It could be argued here that a low IQ nation is more likely to struggle with developing a system that's ironically, meant to improve their lives as a whole. Which I believe is true. And to make matters worse again, the Africans who could have been part of these boardroom meetings aimed at fixing these problems, would rather get the same job but in another high paying country instead. So it's a cycle of putting incompetent people in charge, who make systematic mistakes that doom the next generation, who are either forced to go through a failed learning system, or the ones who do pass with flying colors, quickly abandon the country for the next best thing.

I wouldn't dwell to much on those numbers. Polish IQ certainly didn't go down one standard deviation within 10 years. These are mostly measurement errors.

So what do you propose happened to Europe in the last 100 years? Was IQ always on the rise, as it should be. Because industrialization and the flynn effect have been linked to increasing IQ scores? Or did the Soviet/Eastern Bloc countries have deleterious effects on their population, as a result of food shortages and state sponsored fear?

I picked Taiwan and Hong Kong because they are both >90% Han Chinese, not because they are neighboring countries. That's why I called them mini Chinas

If you use ethnicities, doesn't this throw out the entire principle of grabbing IQ scores from neighboring nations? Israel borders many Arab nations but they are regarded as different people. Cuba, Jamaica, Dominican Republic & Haiti are all distinct from one another despite being Caribbean islands. Brazil differs a lot from the rest of South America for being one of the few non-Spanish colonized countries. And Africa has several distinct ethnic groups, it would be unfair to say the San People of South Africa are somehow directly related to the Ethiopians in the far North, or the Bantus in the West part of the continent.

And while I agree with you that yes, China, Hong Kong, Taiwan are indeed related by blood, it's still unfair to copy and paste statistical information from one another. This was used in the North Korea/South Korea comparison. Not only do they have different governments and economic success, but biologically speaking, North Koreans are suffering by growing up shorter than their South Korean cousins (again, most likely a result of the massive famines they had in the 1990s).

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-41228181

In Chinese history, we do know Mao and the Communist government had equally starved off millions of their own people, while Hong Kong and Taiwan were fortunate enough to have not been sewn at the hip to experience that regime.