J. Philippe Rushton

You don't need to be Editor-In-Chief to add or edit content to WikiDoc. You can begin to add to or edit text on this WikiDoc page by clicking on the edit button at the top of this page. Next enter or edit the information that you would like to appear here. Once you are done editing, scroll down and click the Save page button at the bottom of the page.

Jump to: navigation, search

John Philippe (Phil) Rushton (born December 3, 1943) is a psychology professor at the University of Western Ontario, Canada, known for his work on intelligence and racial differences, such as his book Race, Evolution and Behavior. He is the current head of the Pioneer Fund.

Biography

Rushton was born in Bournemouth, England where his father was a building contractor. His mother was of French descent. His family emigrated to South Africa where Rushton lived from age 4 to 8 (1948-1952). He lived for a time in Canada, and returned to England where he studied psychology at Birkbeck College at the University of London and graduated in 1970. In 1973, he received his Ph.D. from the London School of Economics after studying altruism among children. He was at the University of Oxford until 1974, and taught at York University in Canada from 1974-1976 and the University of Toronto until 1977 when he was hired at the University of Western Ontario and became a full professor in 1985.

Rushton has published more than 250 articles and six books, including two on altruism, one on scientific excellence, and co-authored an introductory psychology textbook.[1] Over ten of his papers have appeared in Intelligence, a journal for which Rushton sits on the editorial board. He is a signatory to the opinion piece "Mainstream Science on Intelligence".[1]

He is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and the American, British, and Canadian psychological associations. In 1988 he was made a Fellow of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and in 1992 he received a D.Sc. in psychology from the University of London.

Work

Genetic similarity hypothesis

Rushton began his career with studies on altruism. He has hypothesized a heritable component in altruism and is the creator of the Genetic Similarity Theory, which asserts that individuals tend to be more altruistic to individuals who are genetically similar to themselves (kin selection), and less altruistic, and sometimes outwardly hostile to individuals who are less genetically similar. Rushton describes "ethnic conflict and rivalry" as "one of the great themes of historical and contemporary society" and suggests that it may have its roots in the evolutionary impact on individuals from groups "giving preferential treatment to genetically similar others." Rushton argues that "the makeup of a gene pool [i.e., a human population's total reservoir of alternative genes] causally affects the probability of any particular ideology being adopted."

Race evolution hypothesis

Rushton wrote Race, Evolution and Behavior (1995) in which he uses the r/K selection theory to explain why he found East Asians consistently averaged high, Blacks low, and Whites in the middle on characteristics which he claims are indicative of nurturing behavior on an evolutionary scale. Rushton began publishing his theory in 1984. He claims that East Asians and their descendants average a larger brain size, greater intelligence, more sexual restraint, slower rates of maturation, and greater law abidingness and social organization than do Europeans and their descendants, who average higher scores on these dimensions than Africans and their descendants.[1] Rushton contends that through the course of world history, there has been an anatomical correlation between brain weight and penis size, that is, the larger the brain, the smaller the penis. "It's a trade off, more brains or more penis. You can't have everything," he told Rolling Stone in 1994.[1]

Rushton's work in this area has been referred to by Steve Sailer writing at VDARE as "Rushton's Rule of Three". Sailer argues that Rushton's comparisons are more informative than many traditional comparisons by analyzing characteristics across three races instead of two, providing a reference point for analyses between two other races.

Opinions on Rushton and his work

Support

Harvard biologist E.O. Wilson (one of the two co-founders of the r/K selection theory Rushton's cites) defends Rushton:

I think Phil is an honest and capable researcher. The basic reasoning by Rushton is solid evolutionary reasoning; that is, it is logically sound. If he had seen some apparent geographic variation for a non-human species - a species of sparrow or sparrow hawk, for example - no one would have batted an eye.[1]

Science journalist Peter Knudson stated:

Despite the occasional media stereotype of Rushton as some sort of incompetent scientific adventurist, he has throughout most of his career as a psychologist been seen as a highly competent researcher. He has published more than 100 papers, most of them, particularly those dealing with altruism, in highly respectable journals.[1]

Psychologist Hans Eysenck of the University of London said:

Professor Rushton is widely known and respected for the unusual combination of rigour and originality in his work... (and commenting on Rushton's book Race, Evolution and Behavior) ... Few concerned with understanding the problems associated with race can afford to disregard this storehouse of well-integrated information which gives rise to a remarkable synthesis.[2]

Criticisms of motivation and funding

Since 2002, Rushton has been the president of the Pioneer Fund. Tax records from 2000 show that his Charles Darwin Institute received $473,835 — 73% of that year's grants.[1] The Pioneer Fund has been listed by the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) as a hate group.[1][1] The SPLC reports that Rushton has spoken on eugenics several times at conferences of the American Renaissance magazine, in which he has also published a number of articles.[1] Anti-racist Searchlight Magazine described one these meetings as a "veritable 'who’s who' of American white supremacy" but also that Rushton's "imputation that on 'average' Asians might have a higher IQ than whites left more than one diner at our table with a bitter taste in the mouth after an otherwise pleasant meal."[1]

Popular science commentator David Suzuki protested Rushton's racial theories and spoke out against Rushton in a live televised debate at the University of Western Ontario. "There will always be Rushtons in science," Suzuki said "and we must always be prepared to root them out!". "Oh, no!" exclaimed Rushton when asked if he himself believed in racial superiority. He went on to explain that "from an evolutionary point of view, superiority can only mean adaptive value--if it even means this. And we've got to realize that each of these populations is perfectly, beautifully adapted to their own ancestral environments."[1].

He has written articles for VDARE, a website that advocates reduced immigration into the United States.[1] Stefan Kühl wrote in his book The Nazi Connection: eugenics, American racism, and German national socialism that Rushton was a part of the revival of public interest in scientific racism in the 1980s.[1]

William H. Tucker, critic of the hereditarian point of view, states:

Rushton has not only contributed to American Renaissance publications and graced their conferences with his presence but also offered praise and support for the "scholarly" work on racial differences of Henry Garrett, who spent the last two decades of his life opposing the extension of the Constitution to blacks on the basis that the "normal" black resembled a European after frontal lobotomy. Informed of Garrett's assertion that blacks were not entitled to equality because their "ancestors were ... savages in an African jungle," Rushton dismissed the observation as quoted "selectively from Garrett's writing," finding nothing opprobrious in such sentiments because the leader of the scientific opposition to civil rights had made other statements about black inferiority that were, according to Rushton, "quite objective in tone and backed by standard social science evidence." Quite apart from the questionable logic in defending a blatant call to deprive citizens of their rights by citing Garrett's less offensive writing—as if it were evidence of Ted Bundy's innocence that there were some women he had met and not killed—there was no sense on Rushton's part that all of Garrett's assertions, whether or not "objective," were utterly irrelevant to constitutional guarantees, which are not predicated on scientific demonstrations of intellectual equality."[1]

The Southern Poverty Law Center has criticized[1] Rushton for another statement. "But people are pulling their hair out and are saying, ‘What about Toronto the Good? Where did it go to?’ What about Ottawa? I’m sure it is the same? What about Montreal? I’ll bet you it’s the same. I’ll bet it’s the same in every bloody city in Canada where you have black people. It’s inevitable that it won’t be."

Criticisms of methodology

See also: Race, Evolution and Behavior

There have been criticisms of Rushton's work in the scholarly literature, most of which Rushton has replied to, often in the same journals. For example, Zack Cernovsky, in the Journal of Black Studies, has made several criticisms, such as "some of Rushton's references to scientific literature with respects to racial differences in sexual characteristics turned out to be references to a nonscientific semipornographic book and to an article in the Penthouse Forum."[1]

Steven Cronshaw and colleagues wrote in a paper for the International Journal of Selection and Assessment in 2006 that psychologists should critically examine the science employed in Rushton's race-realist research. Through a re-analysis of the validity criteria for test bias using data reported in the Rushton et al. paper they assert that the testing methods were in fact biased against Black Africans. They disagree with other aspects of Rushton's methodology such as the use of non-equivalent groups in test samples.[1] Rushton replied in the next issue of the journal saying his results were valid and it was the criticisms that were wrong.[1]

Lisa Suzuki and Joshua Aronson of New York University wrote in 2005 that Rushton has ignored evidence that fails to support his position that IQ test score gaps represent a genetic racial hierarchy. He has not changed his position on this matter for 30 years.[1] Rushton replied in the same issue of the journal.[1]

After mailing a booklet to psychology, sociology, and anthropology professors across North America, Hermann Helmuth, a professor of anthropology at Trent University, asserted: "It is in a way personal and political propaganda. There is no basis to his scientific research." Rushton said, "It's not racist, it's a matter of science and recognizing variation in all groups of people."[1]

Scholarly misconduct

In 1988, Rushton was twice formally reprimanded by the University of Western Ontario for conducting research on human subjects without the permission of the university's committees on ethics. According to articles that appeared in the Canadian press based on interviews with Rushton's first-year psychology students, Rushton surveyed his students by asking "such questions as how large their penises are, how many sex partners they have had, and how far they can ejaculate, according to students who took the survey."[1]

Rushton's ethical lapse was considered serious at Western Ontario because first-year psychology students are required "to participate in approved surveys as a condition of their studies. If they choose not to, they must write five research papers. Also, many students feel subtle pressure to participate in order not to offend professors who may later be grading their work. However, if a study is not approved these requirements do not apply at all."[1] For taking advantage of students and failing to tell them they had the option not to participate without incurring additional work, Rushton was reprimanded and barred from using students as research subjects for two years.[1]

Also in 1988. Rushton conducted a survey at the Eaton Centre mall in Toronto where he paid 50 whites, 50 blacks, and 50 Asians to answer questions about their sexual habits. For the ethical lapse of failing to receive permission for his off-campus research, the administration at the University of Western Ontario administration itself reprimanded Rushton. This was "a serious breach of scholarly procedure," said University President, George Pederson.[1]

References

See also

External links

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:

Criticism

Works by Rushton

Pro-Rushton

WikiDoc Help Menu

Quick Start..

Editing basics

Advanced editing

Communicating your edits

Help Videos You Can Watch



Acknowledgement and Attribution Regarding Sources of Content

Some of the initial content on this page may be incorporated in part from copyleft sources in the public domain including wikis such as Wikipedia and AskDrWiki. Drug information for patients came from the The National Library of Medicine. Infectious disease information may have come from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). Differential Diagnoses are drawn from clinicians as well as an amalgamation of 3 sources: 1.The Disease Database; 2. Kahan, Scott, Smith, Ellen G. In A Page: Signs and Symptoms. Malden, Massachusetts: Blackwell Publishing, 2004:3; 3. Sailer, Christian, Wasner, Susanne. Differential Diagnosis Pocket. Hermosa Beach, CA: Borm Bruckmeir Publishing LLC, 2002:7 .

Retrieved from "http://www.wikidoc.org/index.php/J._Philippe_Rushton"
Personal tools
In other languages