A bit of race science in the NYT opinion section.

The paper of record posting some light race science. From everyone's favorite columnist, Bret "The Bedbug" Stephens.

"The Secrets of Jewish Genius"

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/27/o...=tw-nytopinion

The paper later retracted a portion of the column with this comment:

Quote:

An earlier version of this Bret Stephens column quoted statistics from a 2005 paper that advanced a genetic hypothesis for the basis of intelligence among Ashkenazi Jews. After publication Mr. Stephens and his editors learned that one of the paper’s authors, who died in 2016, promoted racist views. Mr. Stephens was not endorsing the study or its authors’ views, but it was a mistake to cite it uncritically. The effect was to leave an impression with many readers that Mr. Stephens was arguing that Jews are genetically superior. That was not his intent. He went on instead to argue that culture and history are crucial factors in Jewish achievements and that, as he put it, “At its best, the West can honor the principle of racial, religious and ethnic pluralism not as a grudging accommodation to strangers but as an affirmation of its own diverse identity. In that sense, what makes Jews special is that they aren’t. They are representational.” We have removed reference to the study from the column.

Brett originally cited Henry Harpending, who claims the genetics make Jews inherently smarter, sub-saharan blacks inherently lazy, and other such lovely eugenicist nonsense. Harpending was widely considered a white supremacist crackpot by real geneticists

Henry in his own words:
https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-h...nry-harpending

via International Skeptics Forum https://ift.tt/2QbfQt6