Via Pixabay
For hundreds of years, white Europeans believed that everyone else - especially Black people - was inferior, and deserved atrocities like slavery and genocide. In recent centuries, their descendants have used “science” to justify similar behavior.
Far from “impartial,” science has always been used to support the prejudice and bias of the powerful at the expense of everyone else. “Intelligence” - as measured by IQ - is one example.
Studies showing that non-white people are less “intelligent” have been used in the U.S. for centuries - supporting segregation, marriage laws, army policy, public school admissions, restrictive immigration policies, and more.
American racial “science” was even used by the German Nazi party in the 1930s to justify the mass killings of Jewish people!
The major flaws in the science of “intelligence” are two-fold: first, there are a variety of types of intelligence, but IQ tests only measure one.
Second, “intelligence” is much more a result of one’s circumstances than one’s genetics.
One study tested orphans from low-income families that were adopted by high-income families and found that on average, their “intelligence” went up by 14 points!
Could any IQ test that doesn’t take peoples’ history and circumstances into account be fair? The truth has been settled - IQ has a long, racist history, and is not a useful measure of ANY human being’s value to society.