Why it is reasonable to label Nathan Cofnas’ race realism as pseudoscientific (Pieter Beck, 25th September 2026, Skeptic)
Nathan Cofnas, the self-professed “race realist” who made international headlines when he accused Cambridge academic Jason Arday of plagiarism, has defended his “hereditarianism” position as scientific. I would argue, instead, that such beliefs are pseudoscientific.
Cofnas is mostly known for his controversial blogpost “A Guide for the Hereditarian Revolution”, in which (among other things) he claims that “[In a meritocracy] Blacks would disappear from almost all high-profile positions outside of sports and entertainment.” Cofnas believes races are real (hence “race realism”) and that differences between races are due to genetic factors (hence “hereditarianism”). He puts most of his emphasis on differences in IQ, but also refers to other properties. Cofnas never makes explicit to what degree he thinks genes contribute to observed differences, but based on statements which suggest that he believes environmental interventions are useless, the role he confers to genetic factors must be very high.
Cofnas has received his fair share of criticism from relevant experts. When asked to comment about the claims Cofnas is making about race, IQ-expert Han van der Maas said that “Exceptional claims require exceptionally strong evidence, and I don’t see Cofnas providing such evidence.” Biologist Kevin Bird wrote: “Cofnas & all other scientific racists fail to meet basic academic standards. They don’t read or engage with evidence.” Biologist Gregory Kohn wrote that “Cofnas consistently resists even approaching the modern scientific literature. […] He traffics in shallow controversy and shallow controversy alone.” Geneticist Adam Rutherford: “Cofnas’ work is crap, and should never have been granted scholarly credibility.” And statistical geneticist Sasha Gusev has called Cofnas a “shallow thinker” and “racist” and said his work is based on “zero evidence whatsoever”.
However, to date I am not aware of any discussion of Cofnas’s pseudoscience in depth. People on both sides of the debate (pro and contra Cofnas) have a tendency to argue in the abstract, rather than discussing concrete passages from Cofnas’s work, as I will do here, citing Cofnas extensively. Since I am making quite a strong claim by using the term pseudoscience, I have an obligation to provide enough evidence.
There’s no such thing as specxies.
