First of all, race has absolutely, categorically no impact on intelligence. It is a construct of Western civilization used to ascribe inherent traits for, primarily, economic exploitation and the perpetuation of various hegemonies. Second, Africa has had myriad 'civilizations' that thrived and fell well before the expansion of Europeans into the continent with the advent of quinine. By 1400 there were over 20 cities on the African continent with populations over 20,000 people whereas there were 4 in Europe. While this, unfortunately, operates on the erroneous assumption that size and complexity of infrastructure indicates 'civilization,' a term usually used to disparage native peoples to continue their subjugation, if this is the quality you're looking for, ancient Africa has it in spades. I would point you to the Malian Empire, the Kingdom of Zimbabwe or the Kingdom of Kush as a few examples of complex empire across the African continent. As to the foolish sentiment as to the lack of black Nobel laureates, that is entirely predicated on the fact that ideologies of racism have flourished by reducing educational, and thus economic, opportunities to blacks. As such, public schools in largely black areas, on this continent and Africa, have been severely lacking since their inception and without strong, institutionalized education it is a virtual impossibility that you will be able to submit work that meets the standards of the Nobel committee. In addition, as the Nobel Prize was founded in 1901, 53 years before Brown vs. Board of Education and the beginning of the end of Jim Crow segregation in the US, blacks would simply have been refused consideration by the prize's committee. Race is a social construct that inaccurately ascribes inherent traits based on skin color to perpetuate power dynamics. Nothing more.

Lots of population, not a lot of education opportunities, so hes probably right. Same with folks in the middle east.

True - though a lot of Africa is actually savannah and tropical woodlands where the climatic adversity and the need to plan for dry and growing seasons are much alike what motivated the growth of cities and states elsewhere in the world, even on pre-colombian America, and most of Africa is a mineral-rich crystalline shield.

I think maybe the people who migrated from Africa were subjected to an evolutionary bottleneck who poised them just right on a short ammount of (geologic) time to develop civilization. Most of the subsaharian peoples perhaps were not subject to the same sort of pressure in the time modern civilization developed. It's telling that, asides from a few stone artifacts on Zimbabwe, most african civilizations were the result of conquest or cultural spill from somewhere else (Madagascar from Austronesians, the old Mali empire and the Tutsis from the Berbers...).

Of course, a statistic encompassing an entire people tells nothing of an individual on itself, and even when it does, it means we are allowed to treat people on a discriminatory fashion? Would you treat your neighboor differently if therw was hard evidence he comes from a less intelligent ethnic stock? Food for thought.

How about ancient Ethiopia?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kingdom_of_Aksum

I'm not a racist but this question makes me wander (please don't ban me) - why hasn't there been a great black civilization in the past? Also why none of the black Africa countries prospers. Also why hasn't any of the big inventions come from Africa, you know wheel, paper, gun powder etc.

To be honest, the way the OP is setup, it feels more like these opinions are OP's and he wants to debate them without comitting to saying they're his and potentially earning himself a ban.

If i had to guess, I'd probably run with it being a reactionary response to : http://gamrconnect.vgchartz.com/thread.php?id=188443&page=1#

If this isn't the case, OP. then the answer is simple.

Don't respond to him, why waste your time?

why are ancient civilisations like the egyptian and sumerian civilisations excluded?

they had technology and an understanding of the world that as far as i know far outstripped their european counterparts

the way i see it is that eauropeans are having their chance in this time period to lead technological innovation... but thats not to say its always been that way

Exactly.

http://mises.org/daily/5336/The-Ash-Heap-of-History

"[Aksumites'] prosperity was built upon two informal but core tenets: noninterventionism and the maintenance of a broadly accepted, market-dictated currency standard. These codes, even beyond their enviable geographic location, proved critical in the ascendancy of the Aksumites, quickly bringing them to prominence as a preferred trading center... the Aksumite civilization is a counterexample to a host of pseudoscientific, ethnocentric, and sometimes blatantly racist assertions regarding the social history of Africa... Archeological evidence reveals that the quality of the Aksumite coins — both in terms of their metal content and sharpness of production — declined markedly during this period.[24] It's a clear sign that in addition to having abandoned centuries of largely nonpartisan policies, the Aksumites had also, in the process, reneged on their commitment to a sound currency in favor of inflationary war finance"

Some thoughts:

-The Nobel prize thing is stupid, so don't even bother arguing with this guy.

-Also, the lack of successful black governments may say something about current or past "black culture", but it says nothing about intelligence.  I would say it's more about education and time.

-That said, it's silly to say one race couldn't be "smarter" than another, on average.  Some groups of people are taller, shorter, lighter, darker, faster, etc.  There is nothing wrong with saying a group could be, on average, smarter.  It's not a racist statement.  It's racist to say it without foundation, however, and the Nobel prize thing is a very weak argument.

-For those who don't know, there are three races in the world:  Asian, Caucasian, and African.  Indians, Arabs, etc are Caucasian, just like Brits or French or Germans.  Also Caucasian are ancient Egyptians, who do not share common DNA with either Africans or the current Arab-dominated population.  The closest modern-day relations of ancient Egyptians are the Copts.  They can be darker skin, and often have a broader nose than most Caucasians - and Romans may have called them "black", but it doesn't mean they are of Affrican Race.  Modern Copts, with their broad noses, wide ears and reddish-brown skin look a fair amount like classic Egyptian wall paintings:

based on?