Continuing to look at demographic differences in levels of basic scientific knowledge, we now move onto racial groups. The following table shows differences in responses, by race, to the science module of items deployed by the GSS during 2004 and 2006. Some of the questions are inverted from the GSS for viewer ease so that in all cases, the higher the percentage, the more knowledgeable the group is. Bright green indicates the highest level of relative knowledge, followed by black, orange, and red:
Before balking at the superior performance of whites when compared not only to NAMs but also to Asians, consider what the NAEP shows us regarding science scores. Looking California and New York--states with the two largest Asian populations in the country--notice that whites outperform Asians in science in both of them (for Texas and New Jersey, the states coming in third and fourth in Asian collecting, that is not the case, however). The Asian advantage is pronounced in math, less so (if at all) in science, and actually a slight deficit in reading.
Darwin's famous quote, "It is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science," illustrates a sentiment that is shared more by whites than by non-whites. Excepting an awareness of evolution and heliocentrism, whites are more scientifically literate than non-whites (somewhat surprisingly, including Asians) are.
Religious conservatives like to point out that blacks and Hispanics are more likely to conceive of the universe as being divinely created than whites are, and consequently militant atheists like Richard Dawkins are attacking the NAM worldview especially hard. Like emphasizing black opposition to same-sex marriage and Hispanic opposition to abortion, this tactic has failed to spur NAMs to join the ranks of the political right, but this provides more evidence that said religious conservatives are correct in their assertions.
The item on lasers is a dichotomous one. Blacks would have actually fared better by answering randomly. Majorities of NAMs operate under the assumption that antibiotics treat both bacterial and viral infections. Among readers in the Steveosphere and among SWPLs alike, cognizance of the fact that in the 21st century one in three black Americans believe the sun rotates around the earth is probably uncommon. One in five--about 40 million--white Americans believe the same.
| Item | White | Black | Hispanic | Asian |
| Astrology is not scientific | 70.6% | 50.0% | 56.6% | 64.0% |
| The benefits of science exceed the harms | 78.2% | 53.7% | 64.9% | 64.2% |
| Understands the need for control groups in testing | 82.8% | 75.1% | 70.5% | 80.5% |
| The earth's core is very hot | 92.9% | 78.3% | 77.5% | 83.5% |
| Demonstrates a basic understanding of probability | 95.4% | 91.5% | 84.5% | 90.1% |
| Not all radioactivity is man-made | 85.7% | 66.9% | 68.1% | 68.9% |
| Father, not mother, determines a child's sex | 76.8% | 63.8% | 73.0% | 67.4% |
| Lasers are not made by condensing sound waves | 74.3% | 45.9% | 60.5% | 64.2% |
| Electrons are smaller than atoms | 74.5% | 57.6% | 66.4% | 75.9% |
| Antibiotics do not kill viruses | 66.1% | 31.4% | 36.2% | 53.3% |
| Continental drift has and continues to occur | 91.1% | 79.9% | 85.3% | 90.7% |
| Humans evolved from other animals | 52.6% | 33.9% | 47.7% | 68.9% |
| The earth revolves around the sun | 81.1% | 66.9% | 78.1% | 86.5% |
| It takes the earth one year to rotate around the sun | 79.2% | 69.7% | 64.5% | 85.0% |
| Respondent will eat genetically modified foods | 72.2% | 52.5% | 68.3% | 79.2% |
| The north pole is on a sheet of ice | 64.6% | 56.8% | 77.6% | 66.6% |
Before balking at the superior performance of whites when compared not only to NAMs but also to Asians, consider what the NAEP shows us regarding science scores. Looking California and New York--states with the two largest Asian populations in the country--notice that whites outperform Asians in science in both of them (for Texas and New Jersey, the states coming in third and fourth in Asian collecting, that is not the case, however). The Asian advantage is pronounced in math, less so (if at all) in science, and actually a slight deficit in reading.
Darwin's famous quote, "It is those who know little, not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science," illustrates a sentiment that is shared more by whites than by non-whites. Excepting an awareness of evolution and heliocentrism, whites are more scientifically literate than non-whites (somewhat surprisingly, including Asians) are.
Religious conservatives like to point out that blacks and Hispanics are more likely to conceive of the universe as being divinely created than whites are, and consequently militant atheists like Richard Dawkins are attacking the NAM worldview especially hard. Like emphasizing black opposition to same-sex marriage and Hispanic opposition to abortion, this tactic has failed to spur NAMs to join the ranks of the political right, but this provides more evidence that said religious conservatives are correct in their assertions.
The item on lasers is a dichotomous one. Blacks would have actually fared better by answering randomly. Majorities of NAMs operate under the assumption that antibiotics treat both bacterial and viral infections. Among readers in the Steveosphere and among SWPLs alike, cognizance of the fact that in the 21st century one in three black Americans believe the sun rotates around the earth is probably uncommon. One in five--about 40 million--white Americans believe the same.
The strong showing by Hispanics on the question about the terrain of the North Pole is a potentially intriguing outlier. It's possibly the the result of a data entry error, but it could also be legitimate, though I don't have much of an idea as to why such a strong exception to the general pattern that emerges from performance on the rest of the items exists.
As was pointed out in the comments to the initial post on scientific literacy by partisan identification, race is a confounding factor that obfuscates the white liberal v. white conservative status competition that SWPLs truly care about. I'll reconstruct the table from that post, restricted to whites only, in the near future.
GSS variables used: RACECEN1(1)(2)(4-10)(15-16), ASTROSCI, SCIBNFTS, EXPDESGN, ODDS1, HOTCORE, RADIOACT, BOYORGRL, LASERS, ELECTRON, VIRUSES, CONDRIFT, EVOLVED, EARTHSUN, SOLARREV, EATGM, ICESHEET
GSS variables used: RACECEN1(1)(2)(4-10)(15-16), ASTROSCI, SCIBNFTS, EXPDESGN, ODDS1, HOTCORE, RADIOACT, BOYORGRL, LASERS, ELECTRON, VIRUSES, CONDRIFT, EVOLVED, EARTHSUN, SOLARREV, EATGM, ICESHEET
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