Are racial differences in intelligence scientifically true?

Here's an extract from an interview with James Watson, one of the men who discovered the double-helix structure of DNA, in 2007:

>He says that he is “inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa” because “all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours – whereas all the testing says not really”, and I know that this “hot potato” is going to be difficult to address. His hope is that everyone is equal, but he counters that “people who have to deal with black employees find this not true”. He says that you should not discriminate on the basis of colour, because “there are many people of colour who are very talented, but don’t promote them when they haven’t succeeded at the lower level”. He writes that “there is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically. Our wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will not be enough to make it so”.

Is he right?

Other urls found in this thread:

bbc.com/news/health-29480803
ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2015/crime-in-the-u.s.-2015/tables/expanded_homicide_data_table_3_murder_offenders_by_age_sex_and_race_2015.xls
news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/cbc-no-caucasian
gislounge.com/whats-in-a-map/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Transracial_Adoption_Study#cite_note-scarr2-2
iq-research.info/en/page/average-iq-by-country
youtu.be/LPjzfGChGlE
twitter.com/NSFWRedditGif

we don't know

What do you think is the best explanation based on the data that is available?

And just to be clear, you are then admitting it is perfectly possible that certain races could be, on average, less intelligent, as determined by their genes, correct?

> Are racial differences in intelligence scientifically true?
Considering that nutrition plays a huge role in development and we don't have much in the way of research into intelligence across races that corrects for differences in nutrition, I'd say the answer is "Who the fuck knows, not enough data."

And that's not even touching things like lead poisoning, which has only declined relatively recently and even then somewhat unevenly.

The answer is actually no. We know that intelligence must involve a very high number of genes, and we can measure the overall genetic diversity of humans. Even if 100% of genetic differences between races was all located in genes for intelligence, it wouldn't account for a large IQ gap. You would have to have hundreds of genes all have very largely clustered amounts of allele frequencies. We simply don't observe that.

Intelligence isn't an average of every contributing gene. You can't just say "muh diversity of genes" without talking about the effects of each expressed gene in their different variations. If you have different selective pressures, you will have different combinations of alleles that will end up being passed down more frequently than other combinations.

Why is retardation one of the most common kinds of birth defects? There are many more people with gene defects that make them retarded than people with gene defects that make them born with no arms or with no toes.

You can make theories about why your preconceived notions might be true all you want, but what we observe in reality is that intelligence seems to vary a lot on a genetic level, even if you imagine that there are only 2 levels of intelligence possible; normal and retarded.

We've been search for genes related to intelligence for about two decades. We thought we found some, turns out we didn't. We still haven't found a single one, and the statistical power of modern genetic analysis is staggering. This discounts any possibility of a single or small number of genes that have a large impact. We will without a doubt found hundreds of genes that all play a small part.

Select pressure has nothing to do with it... You clearly do not understand evolution. Natural selection only acts on a small number of traits at a time, and never without a lot of pressure. That would lead to extinction. There is no evidence that intelligence has ever been selected for in humans in any particular environment. In fact, it was our ability to make tools and clothing that allowed us to overcome selective pressures and leave Africa to begin with.

>inb4 cold makes you smart!
Just go back to /pol/ or educate yourself, brainlet. This isn't the place for you.

Those are almost always massive errors in the genome... for example, as in your case, and extra chromosome. That's just a difference of a few genes.

This is the correct answer.

Though one could probably cite some relevant adoption studies at this juncture.

Downs syndrome is caused by an entire extra chromosome, not just a few genes.

You can deny the reality of human genetics all you want, and you can claim that environmental influence don't matter, but you'd still be retarded.

>Considering that nutrition plays a huge role in development
Right... do you know whether it plays a huge role in *intelligence*, specifically? Do you have data and evidence for this?

>We know that intelligence must involve a very high number of genes, and we can measure the overall genetic diversity of humans. Even if 100% of genetic differences between races was all located in genes for intelligence, it wouldn't account for a large IQ gap. You would have to have hundreds of genes all have very largely clustered amounts of allele frequencies. We simply don't observe that.
This doesn't at all support your very definitively stated conclusion of "no".

We already know that genes contribute to:
>Differences in skin colour
>Differences in hair texture
>Differences in height (Africans are, on average, much taller than Asians)

So how can you *conclusively* say that intelligence can't be determined by different genes in different populations? You can't, can you?

You wouldn't ask an astrophysicist how to operate on a brain tumor, why the fuck would you ask a chemist about psychology and evolution? Fucking scientists need to stick to their area of expertise, this is obviously not Watson's and his views are stupid. Also Rosalind Franklin deserves the credit for his "discovery". The man is a fucking sham.

Also IQ and other tests have proven time and again to have bias and to be inaccurate measures of intelligence. When you stack the cards in a racist manner of course they're going to have a racist outcome.

This statement confuses me. If retardation is far more common than missing arms or legs does that not there for imply that there are far more genes and interactions between genes governing intelligence than governing the growth and implementation of limbs?

Does this not further his point instead of yours? Or am I missing something?

You have to go back.

>So how can you *conclusively* say that intelligence can't be determined by different genes in different populations? You can't, can you?
Those traits all involve a very small number of genes.

Intelligence involves hundreds at least.

>Right... do you know whether it plays a huge role in *intelligence*, specifically? Do you have data and evidence for this?

I'm not the guy you're arguing with but we do have some evidence for this. Pic related.

I am by no mean a believer in the myth of humanity or a diversity pusher, but I also have some doubts about the racialist theory of intelligence.

All I'm saying is that we know, for a fact, that DNA changes can and do cause massive changes in intelligence frequently, and much MORE frequently than other physical changes to the human body. As for the reason that is the case, I make no claims. That's just how it is.

>Those traits all involve a very small number of genes.

Height does not depend on a small number of genes. (As far as I know.)

bbc.com/news/health-29480803

It's apples and oranges. An entire extra chromosome is not the same as a few different alleles.

>There is no evidence that intelligence has ever been selected for in humans in any particular environment.
Apart from the fact that cultures in colder parts of the world have proved to be much more inventive (European, Asian, Inuit humans became much more innovative, much less generally aggressive, and much more co-operative, than those in Africa - that's because co-operation and innovation were needed to survive in these tougher climates).

Here's a question. You accept that we have bred dogs over many many years to select for different behaviour, don't you? Although whether you accept it or not, it's true. CLEARLY, then, *behaviour*, if nothing else, can be passed down through genes. It stands to reason that different ethnic groups, with vastly different phenotypical features (skin colour, hair texture, skull/facial structure, etc.), could very well have different genetically determined ranges of behaviour, then, doesn't it?

>selective breeding is the same as natural selection!!!

Sounds good to me.

There are a lot of forms of retardation that have nothing to do with Down Syndrome. Even without DS in the equation it's pretty common.

It is, though. The only difference is that the selective force is for "things that humans like" instead of "things that make you fuck"

>we do not have much knowledge of the biological determination of intelligence as of yet
>therefore, there are no mean differences in intelligence between the races caused by race related genetic factors

This does not seem correct.

That difference is important. Natural does not selective for traits that human beings find desirable like intelligence, hair color, shitposting ability, etc.

You can shitpost all day long and deny science all you want. There is no evidence for this retarded "cold makes you smart" idea.

As I already stated, we do have a large amount of overall knowledge of genetics, human genetics diversity, and some idea of the concepts genetics as it pertains to human intelligence, such as the likely number of genes involved.

You're trying to claim we know nothing and simply have no idea. That's isn't true.

Pls go.

>brainlet. This isn't the place for you.
>in your case, and extra chromosome
>you'd still be retarded
>The man is a fucking sham
>his views are stupid

I thought science was based on evidence. Right? Presenting your evidence and any conclusions that you have derived from that evidence.

Or am I wrong and science is actually determined by subjective opinions of people you disagree with?

It essentially is

Are you implying that certain areas of scientific inquiry are off limits for political reasons?

If so then I suggest you go to the politics board yourself since politics are what guide your pursuit of knowledge. I seek to acquire all knowledge no matter what the political implications, which is why I am on the science board.

You must be new here. You don't understand how these people work. All the answers the questions are easily available in upper level textbooks about human population genetics. They just don't want to know the truth. They don't want evidence. Even if you link peer reviewed material they wouldn't understand or claim it's a conspiracy.

They do no care about reality. They come here with a political agenda and assume their emotions and beliefs are already true. As you can see in this thread, it will just go back and forth ad nauseam.

Care to share any?

Because it seems to me like you're just avoiding admitting what is a distinct possibility regarding this question - that it could well be that different population groups throughout the world have different mean levels of intelligence, due to genetic differences (which are apparent in so many other things like skin colour, hair texture, facial structure)

>Those traits all involve a very small number of genes.
>Intelligence involves hundreds at least.
So how can anybody be confident that such intelligence-determining genes, numerous in number, are EXACTLY THE SAME across all population groups in the entire world? Or another possibility is that these population groups have different sets of intelligence genes, but yet they just HAPPEN to produce the EXACT SAME RESULT regarding mental capacity.

Neither of these explanations appears very plausible to me.

>I also have some doubts about the racialist theory of intelligence.
I don't see why that study would doubt the racialist theory of intelligence at all. It shows a small IQ difference correlating with a change in diet. But the differences in national average IQs, worldwide, is much larger than just a few points.

>one of the men who discovered the double-helix structure of DNA
Wrong, I think. They imagined a [somewhat] working "microscopic" MODEL for Reality; to describe and to explain what we see happening in the macroscopic world, with our eyes.

HOWEVER, I think the model of dna (rna, replication, ribosomes, five ribose--and all that other chemical stuff about my physical body) is brilliantly imaginative. It is infinitely more interesting science fiction than all the "other science fiction" that's displayed in the science fiction section of book stores and libraries.

>He writes that “there is no firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved identically.

Of course! [Inherited] Ignorance, circumstance, environment, cult-ure (if it exists to a significantly detrimental degree) and caregivers. It is reasonable--it is compassionate--to think that all of us are inherently good (intelligent and competent) on the inside: but cause and effect is real and many people are mentally-stunted (vampires) or brain-dead (zombies, that can't be fixed) because of these influencing factors. It's that ignorance is so ugly and disgusting, that most of the time it's hard to face.

There are intelligent people in all self-id'd race and gender, and it's only reasonable that there would be only a small percentage in the world who have common sense intelligence (not merely idiot savantness or lacking coordination and technical aptitute).

Unfortunately that seems to be the case.

by European you'd have to include the general Indo-Euroepan subgroup, including Greeks and Persians, Indians and to some extent Arabs, and none of those races lived in particularly cold climates, yet those races did at some points in time have a culture of innovation and science

Average intelligence is not very important though. For a civilisation to emerge you dont need very much high iq people. how many scientists, in all of human history, have made all the significant discoveries? 10.000? 100.000? 1 million? definetely a very, very small number compared to the overall population. Point is, most of our intelligence will be wasted anyways. You only need very few smart people in a society. The much more important part is how well can these intelligent people live out their potential?

So the negroes probably have way less highly-intelligent people, than whites, and whites have way less of those, than asians. But that really doesn't matter, because much more important is the kind of system these people live in.

A genius who is born in a tribal village will never fulfill his genius potential. A quite smart, but not genius person born into a wealthy academic family will probably make some contribution to science, although his potential is much smaller, than the genius's in the tribal village.

>You're trying to claim we know nothing and simply have no idea. That's isn't true.

I enjoin you to point out where I stated that we did not know anything about genetic and intelligence, considering that I have summarized your position as stating

>we do not know much

Which seems to be accurate.

Stop panicking about the possibility that mean racial differences in intelligence may be real. It's not an ethical question but something to be investigated.

Yes, human intelligence if determined by environment and if the environment is simple of course humans from simpler Africa would be braindead compared to the more cognitively challenging Europe. Neanderthals are more evidence that Europe makes hominids become smarter overtime because they are probably the only pure hominid species that has intelligence on par with modern humans.

The african blacks however are an example of how braindead the original humans were infact black people might be smarter than the original humans so they were truely fucking retards in Africa until they migrated into temperate climates forcing them to get smarter. The dumb humans that stayed in Africa only got a slight cognitive bonus over time. Where as the temperate humans went from 56 to 100, the african humans went from 56 to 68 or 72(depends on the african country).

Interesting black people are not the dumbest humans one earth, the inhabitants of Papua New Guinea have adult IQs in the low 50s and live in a rainforest simple climate like black people. Even more interesting is the fact that while some blacks managed to build simple civilization, the New Guineas TO THIS DAY are still in the stone age. A close cousin of the New Guinea is the Australian Aboriginal another human group that is dumber than black people.

Surely the desert climate should have made the Abos become smarter but I suppose if you spend too much time in the jungles your brain is fucked for good.

Another example can be seen with Native Americans, notice how the inhabitants of South America are very stupid compared to North America, this is because once again the jungle climate actually makes humans stupider overtime, as the native americans are idiots compared to their closest cousins the Siberian Yakutst in East Russia.

You will also notice that North East Asians are smarter than South East Asians that also in a jungle climate.

no stupid goy

fuck off back to faggot. submitting false reports is also against the rules.

Something intriguing in Australia is the fact that pure Abos are barely criminal compared to mix breeds implying the Abos are so braindead they are incapable of organized crime even simple tribal savagery like black gangbangers is beyond them. Most of the tar skin violence is caused by the african refugee spawn in Australia not even the Abos.

yeah, everybody needs to be as smart as the germanic barbarian tribes and not remain as stupid as those middle eastern egyptians, babylonians and greeks who literally invented western civilization.

>ethnic group commits more crime
>see! they commit crime cuz they're stupid!

>ethnic group commits less crime
>see! they're too stupid too commit crime

lmao

>There are intelligent people in all self-id'd race and gender
Indeed, and I'm not saying there aren't. I'm just wondering whether he is correct about average differences in intelligence across races. Personally I think there is evidence to say that there is. Despite its political unpalatability.

>by European you'd have to include the general Indo-Euroepan subgroup, including Greeks and Persians, Indians and to some extent Arabs, and none of those races lived in particularly cold climates, yet those races did at some points in time have a culture of innovation and science
Indeed, all of those groups should be included - and notice that almost all of them had very advanced cultures - Arabs used to have highly advanced cultures and contributed to maths and science. Persians, the same. And Indians too - they were building brick buildings almost 2,000 years ago.

Regarding coldness, yes I suppose you are right. I also mentioned toughness though. One could argue that leaving sub-saharan Africa in the first place (according to the out of Africa theory that scientists generally seem to agree upon, see pic) presented challenges that those who left had to respond to. Those who settled in the arid land of north Africa / Saudi Arabia (who would eventually become Arabs) would have had significant challenges getting food, compared to those in the grassy jungles of sub-saharan Africa, for example.

...

He said ORGANISED crime, so your equivalence is entirely false.

Because Aboriginals definitely DO commit LOTS of crime - cannibalism, abusing their children - these are very well documented within the Aboriginal community.

...

Sorry, I guess I'm a brainlet, because I can't understand what you're trying to say with this image.

>Tfw black with higher score than the black, white, and asian mean scores.

the gap is getting smaller, brainlet.

and income is highly correlated with score

Also just to remind you that the homicide rate among blacks Americans is SEVEN TIMES HIGHER than that among white Americans (including hispanics). See picture where I have broken down the calculation.

The stats are straight from the FBI, you can look at them yourself right here (look at other years too if you like, the difference between races is almost exactly the same):

ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2015/crime-in-the-u.s.-2015/tables/expanded_homicide_data_table_3_murder_offenders_by_age_sex_and_race_2015.xls

And the gap is still gigantic. I really don't see how this proves what you want it to prove.

My girlfriend is 100% Zimbabwean raised in the UK, she got 120 in a cfit, I think if you look at the evolution in western society, the opposite is true, the majority have evolved to be subservient to a few elite, we became soft due to farming, Africans are more connected to a lifestyle where they had to use intelligence and physical fitness to survive, even these racist undertones based on circumstantial observations of intelligence biased by poverty and products of slavery where intelligence was selectively bred out,

There will be growing pains which can be seen throughout western history and throughout the world today in developing nations, however evolution will eventually select out genes that are beneficial into forming a society, we just have to let time play it's role, things are continually getting better as opposed to the mainstream opinions

>I think if you look at the evolution in western society, the opposite is true, the majority have evolved to be subservient to a few elite, we became soft due to farming
>even these racist undertones based on circumstantial observations

Hang on, so racist undertones based on circumstantial observations are perfectly fine when they're applied to whites?

You've broken your own rule within the same paragraph. How stupid are you?

>Africans are more connected to a lifestyle where they had to use intelligence and physical fitness to survive
Then why don't they use that intelligence to build great societies instead of being 3rd world shitholes?

gb2

Also just to object with another stupid thing you said:

>evolution will eventually select out genes that are beneficial into forming a society
Actually whichever are the strongest / most powerful people (probably those with the most powerful technology, if we look at history) are the ones that will survive.

It's a question of science. I didn't ask a political question.

Why are you politicising a question of science? Are you implying that which areas of scientific enquiry we look into should be politically determined? Because I don't. If you think that then you should probably go to the politics board yourself, because it seems that politics is your greatest interest, rather than science.

Just goes to show that intelligence is not that important. Why is a black man making 200k+ a year while a white man with the same intelligence makes less than 1/10 of that?

Do you really have to ask?

> implying intelligence is linked to cooperation and achievements

Do you have any evidence for this ? And please avoid circular reasoning, I can see it coming.

Another thing I've just thought of:

>if you look at the evolution in western society, the opposite is true, the majority have evolved to be subservient to a few elite
Before this generation of emasculated cucks, I don't think you could call Western men "subservient" in any sense of the term. Men were men, and they bullied and pushed each other out of the way to get to the top.

If you can't achieve anything with intelligence then what's the point of having it in the first place?

news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/cbc-no-caucasian
How's that victim complex holding up? I'm sure the black woman in charge will let you participate in society one day, just keep fighting on the internet you little social justice warrior.

Maybe it's less "cold makes you smart" and more "close, consistently contested borders makes you smart". Evolutionary theory would imply that adaptation is developed generally on survival. Dogs in the Arctic would have thicker fur, cows in places like Cuba can stand high heat, and humans constantly having to fight over small spaces and fertile land after the neolithic revolution would develop better ways to do things like kill, eat, grow, fortify, and kill again.

...

Can you explain the racism in your average IQ test, please?

My understanding, again, is that IQ tests test how able someone is to visualize a broader puzzle into connected pieces, figure out the patterns between those pieces, and coming to logical conclusions on the final piece of the puzzle based on the now realized pattern (i.e: 1 , 3 , 5 , _ ). It's supposed to test your ability to solve complex problems, adapt to abstractly-shown (but ultimately simple) concepts, and critically think. How's that racist?

gislounge.com/whats-in-a-map/
What a fucking shitty map. Only a brainlet would accept this map as anything but propaganda, are you a brainlet?

>psychology is derided as nebulous and lacking rigor
>unless its about some high school exam tier IQ tests, those are fuckin' legit

Yeah sure, the high IQ levels of cultures that are more co-operative. See map here:

How's that defence of the black man holding up? I'm sure he'll let you participate in the society of the future - as long as you give him your 50% of your salary for reparations pay, oh and as long as you let him inseminate your wife because she'd rather go with big athletic black men than a pale, subservient white guy like you.

Of course you'll be raising the half-black child out of your pocket. That will be your new social role. To raise the black man's babies. Do you like cuckoldry per chance? Don't worry, you'll learn to like it.

Just keep fighting on the internet for this brave new world, little social justice warrior. :^)

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minnesota_Transracial_Adoption_Study#cite_note-scarr2-2

Definite proof does not exist to show genetic racial differences in intelligence, but viewing the world without considering the genetic influence of genetics makes no sense.

No successful, advanced black society has ever existed and no satisfactory explanation for the IQ-gap/ differences in achievement seems to be available. Even if we were to prove black people are genetically equal in intelligence (thank god), it would make no fucking sense how a population that we dump tons of fucking money into continues to kill each other and be largely unemployed/criminalized because frankly, the way the winds have been blowing in society the last few decades I really don't think the ethereal, intangible "privilege" forces cause it.
sound statistical analysis right there

Applies to and too. The fact these maps are missing crucial elements (source is the major one) means that they're nothing more than propaganda.
t. someone who studied GIS.

You sound exactly like people screeching about imaginary conspiracies like the patriarchy and white country clubs. Embarrassing.

But still though, you'd have to be seriously blinkered by politics to still be clinging onto the notion that Africans are as intelligent as other races. I mean just look at literally every place they live in large numbers.

Muh slavery can only account for some of that.

I know there are smart black people and I've met a few but you are literally clinging on.

That's fair, here's the source
iq-research.info/en/page/average-iq-by-country

>affirmative action doesn't exist bro!
>anti-white media is a myth! nobody's actually writing articles entitled "white men must be stopped", that's just a conspiracy!
>demographic changes are inevitable - there's no point in trying to oppose it! your vote doesn't matter!
>there's no way that minorities, when they become the majority in america, will gang up on whites! despite the fact that majorities ALWAYS gang up on minorities, in every single part of the world!

youtu.be/LPjzfGChGlE
I've seen this used by /pol/yps several times to argue against immigration, might as well use it to explain why those countries are in such bad shape.

I've seen people on /pol/ say gas the kikes, race war now. I've seen Breitbart and infowars claim all muslims are terrorists. Therefore we should be concerned for the well being of these people being treated poorly by society wouldn't you say? Or does discrimination only apply to white people?

The Jews seem to be doing okay since the holocaust. There's been all sorts of horror committed against people and peoples in history. A few generations is usually all it takes for things to get back on their feet.

I think it's more logical to assume for now that black people are less intelligent until some compelling evidence to the contrary comes up.

Arabs have never contributed shit, it was Indo aryan whites that lived in the caliphate before they got genetically destroyed with inferior arab blood

Hepto-pentos!!!11

very impressive

even if that accounted for problems in other countries (which I doubt) it still wouldn't explain racial disparities within America

this is correct

fucking link it if you have it jesus

It does explain why Canada's smarter than the states. More accepting of immigration means smarter immigrants

>Also IQ and other tests have proven time and again to have bias and to be inaccurate measures of intelligence. When you stack the cards in a racist manner of course they're going to have a racist outcome.
Stop it. IQ tests don't ask what a parlormaid is; there's no cultural or language barrier to IQ tests. They're not an objective measure of intelligence, but intelligence has no objective definition, either. IQ tests are reasonable measures of intelligence for certain purposes, and correlate well with other measures of intelligence for similar purposes. Just because the distribution of IQ scores for certain demographics aren't the same doesn't mean people are going to commit genocide based on this information, so stop claiming that everything is racist and trying to explain away disparity in terms of social factors.

>I've seen people on /pol/ say gas the kikes, race war now
I've seen leftists say kill all white people, what's your point exactly?
>I've seen Breitbart and infowars claim all muslims are terrorists.
No you haven't, so give me your source, because I'm confident that neither have ever claimed that *all* Muslims are terrorists. You're an idiot.
>Therefore we should be concerned for the well being of these people being treated poorly by society wouldn't you say?
But when it's whites you just want to kick them to the curb, blame them for literally fucking EVERYTHING, and tell them they're not even allowed to make their own voting decision by voting Trump, because "ermahgerd he's so sexist/racist, you can't vote for him!"? How dare they! How dare they vote for their own interests! How dare they not roll over and die and let latinos and black inherit the country! How dare they!

some one above us is literally equating down syndrome where there is an entire extra chromosome to the small allele difference between populations.

This is pointless to argue with someone who doesn't want to look up or believe in basic facts, because their arguments are mostly coming from their emotions.

>Therefore we should be concerned for the well being of these people being treated poorly by society wouldn't you say?

What an horrendously stupid idea. It is not the role of any society to care for all the people of the world, never mind those that are its avowed enemy, as are the Muslims, which happen to be enemies of all non Muslim societies, as their "holy" book makes clear.

(Pro-tip: tribalist moralities are okay)

No you haven't. You've seen reasonable and rational people say that not all muslims are terrorists, but all terrorists are muslims.

If you don't consider 499/500 all, you're right. But dopey.

I guess that is why Malays in Singapore score as high as Japan in math and as high in science as the Flemish while Malaysia scores similar to Latvia

Yes but no one wants to admit it because they think the reaction will be genocide.

>"""cultural differences"""
you're not even helping these people by engaging in such denialism

...

> successful, advanced black society

Was Mali not advanced? Was Ethiopia not advanced? Were Songhai, Sokoto, and Ghana not advanced? Why should these societies even conform to your odd standards of advancement, anyways? What matters is that the created societies in which they survived and thrive.