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Racial Differences in Mentality of Indian People!
We now turn to the next question relating to the racial differences in mental characters. Here we have to examine whether, owing to certain biological factors hereditary in race certain groups of men are mentally superior or inferior to others.
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It has been argued that since races differ in physical characters, they also differ mentally. Psychologists and sociologists have given mental tests to members of different races to measure their mental capacity and thereby inferred differences in intellectual ability. The point at issue is to know whether these differences are racial or inborn, and not merely the transitory effect of environment, history or tradition.
Cranial Capacity of Various Races:
Ginsberg has given certain statistics on this point. The most common tests from which mental differences have been inferred are differences in cranial capacity, brain, weight, and the finer configuration of the brain.
Regarding the cranial capacity of different races it has been concluded by Martin that the average capacity of European groups is 1,450 for males; and 1,300 for females, in Australian tribes it is 1,347 for males and 1,181 for females; in the Vedas, 1,250 for males and 1,139 for females; and in the Andaman Islanders 1,281 and 1,148, respectively.
The average given for the Chinese, nomadic Kalmucks, Japanese, Javanese, Kaffir and Araa Xosa is 1,456, 1,466, 1485, 1590, 1,540 and 1,570 respectively. If the correlation between brain capacity and intelligence holds, the Ama Xosa would be the most intelligent race.
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But if to this is added that there are also notable differences among peoples of the same group: for example, the Greenland Eskimos have a capacity of 1,452 while others have 1,563 it is obvious that no definite conclusion can be drawn about race superiority or inferiority on the basis of cranial capacity.
So far as brain weights are concerned, the Europeans are supposed to have an average of 1,316 grammes, Japanese 1,367 Annamites 1,341 Chinese 1,428 Negroes 1,316. We cannot draw any inference on the basis of brain weights as according to Martin, the Peschera, who are described as half animals, have brain weight approximating to that of Europeans.
Concerning the finer structure of the brain, the number of cases examined is usually very small and great individual differences are known to exist. Klineberg, who made a study of about one thousand brains, was bound to confess that there are no varieties of brain limited to any one race and that very likely the finer structure of the brain is not a race character.
Some More Tests:
The best known tests carried out to discover the mental differences of the various races were those conducted by the American Army during World War I. These tests established the superiority of the Nordic races over the Alpine and Mediterranean. But this conclusion was later on withdrawn by Professor Brigham. Most tests of European groups in America registered a definite superiority of northern European over central and southern European immigrants.
The British Isles, Germany, and Holland fared better, while Italians and Poles did not. But many anthropologists as Otto Klineberg, Garth, Freeman have questioned the accuracy of these lasts Psychologists now generally admit that intelligence is affected by environmental factors. I. Q. may be changed by improving the environment. Otto Klineberg applied intelligence tests to school children of various parts of France, Germany and Italy and found the city children superior to rural children.
The testing procedures have eliminated some of the environmental factors but not all. Probably all the environmental differences can never be eliminated. The intelligence tests do not primarily measure inherent gene-determined potentialities; they measure a ‘book’ kind of proficiency. Moreover, racial groups are found to display abilities along different lines and have distinguished themselves at different times in their history.
As pointed out by Alfred Louis Krocher, the eminent American anthropologist, when the Egyptian civilization was flourishing, the Greeks were little more than barbarians; when the Greek civilization reached great heights of development, the Romans were still devoid of any important attainments; and when the Romans achieved a high stage of civilization, the Teutons, who in the recent past claimed a monopoly of superior achievements, were living in a state of semi savagery.
Besides it, we come across the wide range of variations within the same group. It has been found that Negroes educated in North do much better in the tests than those in the South. The fact of the matter, in the words of Hooten, is as follows:
“There are no objective scientific techniques for the measurement of intelligence, temperament, economic capacity etc. that are capable of indiscriminate application to peoples possessing radically different cultures and living under diverse conditions of economic and social environment. Some progress has indeed been made in the devising of non-literate, universal intelligence tests applicable to all peoples in whatever environment. Results of such tests, however, cannot yet be accepted as true appraisals of racial quality.” They are unsubstantiated.
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They appear to be myths invented by the racists to reassure their own national groups about their feelings of superiority. Differences, whether physical or mental, which have been observed among various racial groups, do not necessarily indicate inferiorities or superiorities. As remarked by the late Professor Boas, “There is not the slightest scientific proof that “race” determines mentality, but there is over-whelming evidence that mentality is influenced by traditional culture.”
Nor can it be affirmed that bodily traits are the determinants of achievement. We can find people of energy, creative intellect, and brilliant minds among all the races. The bodily traits cannot be used as indicators of race capacities or behaviour.
Conclusion:
While a racial factor may be involved in the differences in I.Q. performances of different groupings, environmental differences may account for most of the disparity. Until we evolve a better technique for controlling the environmental factor, conclusions regarding racial differences cannot be accurately drawn from comparative inquiries based on intelligence tests.
No claim can be made that one race is intrinsically mentally superior or inferior to another regardless of external factors of which the tradition and education are the most important. The differences in the mental capacities of various races in all probability reflect variations in culture, rather than inherited racial ability.
While there are differences in racial traits and mental habits and culture in mankind, it cannot be proved that they are intrinsically correlated; yet the possibility cannot be denied that a racial group may be mentally superior to another due to some peculiar biological traits because biological phenomena do influence mental operations.
But this supposition has not been proved. Following an unusually and extensive and careful survey, Anastasi and Foley concluded, “It is a fact that there are group differences in behaviour, but not that such differences are racial or biological in origin.
There is a considerable body of data both in racial studies and in other more general investigations on the origins of individual differences in behaviour, to show the influence of environmental factors in behaviour development. But no study has conclusively demonstrated a necessary association between behaviour characteristics and race as such.”
In a firmly knit community people think very much alike, act very much alike, dress very much alike, live in houses furnished more or less alike, act very much alike when there is a death or a wedding and conform to an unwritten social code, but bodily confrontation has nothing to do with all/ this. In some- inexplicable way, we bow to the will of the community. Concluding it may be said that conclusion on the question of racial superiority or inferiority must be carefully drawn, for the subject is rife with emotion. That races differ is clear but the fact remains to be proved.
Some Racial Fallacies:
Above we have questioned the popular notion that there are significant differences in ability among races.
There are some more popular notions which may be examined below:
(i) There are pure races: In the definition of race it was pointed out that modern biology does not admit any pure race and therefore, it is difficult to give a precise definition of race. Intermixture of races has been so universal that a tremendous range of variations can be found within as well as between any of the races.
Since the earliest period of human history, individuals, armies, traders and whole tribes have migrated and intermarried with other physical types, thus breaking up the distinctive hereditary patterns. Races are not so much real things which man has discovered as they are pigeon holes which man has constructed.
There is no nation in the world which can boast of a pure race. Ralph Linton has written that only that race can maintain its purity where women are so ugly and disgusting that they cannot entice men of other races to steal them, or the men of the races are so effeminate that they cannot steal women of other races. Hoebel has written, “There is no such thing as pure race on the face of the globe today, whether there were pure races in the prehistoric past, we do not know. That there never will be a pure race in the future is a certainty.”
(ii) Some races stand lower on the scale of evolution than do others. Some racists assume that the modern Negro more closely resembles the gorilla and chimpanzee than does the White. Thus the Negro is given a low place on the scale of evolution. But this is also a fallacious view since all races stand at about equal distances from their common ancestor.
(iii) Racial intermixture leads to degeneration. The belief that racial intermixture leads to degeneration is a superstition. Sometimes hybrid vigour often results from the crossing of racial stocks which are radically different in physical appearance.
The investigation of Boas proved that the half breed American-Indian is taller and more fertile than the parental Indian and White stocks. Sometimes, crossing of diverse racial strains serves to prevent the manifestation of recessive defects in a grouping. It may not, however, be presumed that race crossing is always biologically desirable.