Friday, November 18, 2005

I'm free, I'm free, I'm free at last!

Today is a Friday at the end of a very long week.

So many things to choose from, so many missed opportunities... eenie meenie minnie moe.

The winner is... Scientist says "Men more intelligent than Women"!

Wow, where to start. Let's begin with how dumb some guy would have to be just to say something like this, at least in the Western Hemisphere.

The study looks at IQ scores. As intelligence scores among the study group rose, Paul Irwing and Professor Richard Lynn say they found a widening gap between the sexes. Sez Lynn:
My work on intelligence and brain size led me to consider the problem that women have smaller brains than men even when allowance is made for their smaller bodies. This implies that men should have higher average IQs than women, but it has been universally asserted that men and women have equal average IQs. In 1994 I proposed that the solution to this problem is that girls mature faster than boys and this compensates for their lower IQs, which only appear at the age of 16 onwards. Among adults men have higher average IQs than women by about 4 IQ points. This advantage consists largely of higher spatial abilities but is also present in non-verbal reasoning.
How many times must we go through this "testing = truth" thing? Anyone recall the spat over SAT tests being unfair to inner-city kids? True or not, anyone who's known a few "smart" people will tell you that in many ways they're dumber than most, sometimes. A test only tells you how well someone scores on what you test them on, but who says that what's on the test is what it is that makes you smart? Ask almost any teacher who now must deal with the testing involved in "No Child Left Behind", and you wont hear them say that the tests show the smartest kids.
I've seen good evidence that mens and womens brains are different, but not that one is any less intelligent than the other.

(Here's a thought of my own that'll probably get in big trouble with the Mrs: an IQ test has a lot of problem solving in it. It's my personal experience that men are more interested in problem-solving than women are. If the IQ test had a section on problem commiserating, men would probably be soundly beaten) (and now, most likely, so will I).

If you want to discredit Lynn, though, you dont have to rely on the man/woman/brain thing, just keep reading his own ideas:
In 1991 I extended my work on race differences in intelligence to other races. I concluded that the average IQ of blacks in sub-Saharan Africa is approximately 70. It has long been known that the average IQ of blacks in the United States is approximately 85. The explanation for the higher IQ of American blacks is that they have about 25 per cent of Caucasian genes and a better environment.
And lo! the return of the theory of the inferiority of the black man! Somebody set this dude up with William Bennett. They can both go to Louisiana, join forces with David Duke, and Bennett can get some gambling in to boot. And if we're really very lucky, another hurricane will show up next summer, and wash them and the glorified strip mall that will be New Orleans into the gulf, and we wont be bothered by any of them again.

For a much better explaination of differences in "intelligence" world-wide, I'd like to turn to a different source, and do a bit of extrapolating. The source is an article by Burkhard Bilger in the New Yorker called "The Height Gap". In it, Bilger discusses how everyone on the planet has the potential to reach the 6' mark (statistically anyway, except the Pygmies, who have a genetic thing going on). The deciding factor is not one of "race". The Chinese are no more prone to be small than the Swedes are, except for the effect of diet on growth. There's no reason to think that diet doesnt affect intelligence much the same.

What's my point, you say?
What is my point... um, I'm very tired, that's my point. I apologize right now for any rambling that may occur/have occurred during the course of this post.

To be honest, I've just wanted to share that height article since I read it. And now I have.

Good night.

2 comments:

United We Lay said...

Well, I'm a woman and I agree with you about the tests. Men and women's brains are different. Men tend to want to get something done perfectly, while women search for the perfect way to do something. I'll use the shopping analogy. Men know what they want before they go to a store. They go directly to that item and buy it. Women, even if they have a list, still look for other things that will improve their situation whether it is clothing, organizing materials, etc. Women browse, find the perfect items, and then buy. They will not think, "I want a shirt" and buy the first shirt they see. Anyway, that was way too much to write to just tell you that I agree.

daveawayfromhome said...

Hey, now wait a minute, that's not how I shop.
Actually, between me and the mrs, I'm the one who will linger all day in a store more than she. I've always thought of it as being like a hunt, though, so maybe I still retain my manliness there.