Orton's Arm

One study found an 86% correlation between adult-level I.Q. scores of identical twins raised apart. On the other hand, if John Doe takes an I.Q. test twice, he's expected to have an 87% correlation between his two test scores. You could very easily make the statement that roughly 86% of variation in people's I.Q. test scores is explained by genetics, while the remaining percentage is simply random variation caused by the nature of the test taking process.

This is a classic case of the pot calling the kettle black.

It's true the conservative movement as a whole espouses certain standards for both private and public life, and that some "conservatives" secretly don't live up to these standards. While not all conservative standards are necessarily for the best (think stem cell research), I don't believe you should stop aspiring toward high ideals in general just because of the danger of hypocrisy.

According to the American Heritage Stedman's Medical Dictionary, heritability means, If you think the definition of heritability disproves anything I've been saying, you simply don't understand the subject matter being debated. Which, based on what I've seen from you over the past few months, would hardly be anything new for you.

That's a bunch of Marxist baloney. Environments don't play the "huge" role in intelligence you describe. If they did, you'd expect to see a "huge" correlation between the adult I.Q.s of unrelated siblings raised together. The correlation for adult I.Q.s of unrelated people raised together is zero! I suggest you start digesting the implications of that fact.

The fact humans may have grown more intelligent over the past 5000 years doesn't mean we're still getting smarter today.

Now that was a post! I noticed how the Dolphins built that defense through the draft. There were eight draft picks starting in Johnson's last year, which went up to ten draft picks starting in his second year removed. I couldn't help but compare that to how TD tried and failed to build the Bills largely through free agency.

Bingo! There's an unwritten rule that if you're going to have a scandalous personal life, you have to be a conservative. Liberals' personal lives are always squeaky clean.

In the past, I've accused you of politicizing what should be a scientific debate. But this most recent post of yours takes the cake. Hey, it doesn't just take the cake, it swallows the cake whole. The statement that "anyone can be a top scientist or engineer with a little bit of hard work" would certainly keep you alive in Stalin's Soviet Union, but it would get you laughed out of any intellectually credible meeting. What's next? Are you going to tell us that "with a little hard work" Stephen Hawking could become a top NFL defensive tackle? In your world genetics don't matter much, and it's all just a question of hard work, right? So Hawking should get off his lazy behind, and start the process of getting that NFL paycheck! Suppose that, say, Leon Lett had dedicated his whole life to intellectual betterment. Do you think he could have achieved what Stephen Hawking achieved? Are you honestly trying to say the only difference between those two's intellectual attainments was how hard they worked? What planet are you living on? The genetics textbook quote you yourself provided displays the utter ridiculousness of the Marxist claptrap you're trying to sell us. According to that book, over half of observed differences in intelligence are due to genetics.

I can see why you think the way you do, but studies show you're wrong. Good environment + low I.Q. genetics = low I.Q. adult. Next time, instead of speculating on how you think I.Q. and heredity might work, you should read actual studies about how these things do work. I suggest you begin by reading this: # Plomin, R. 2004. Intelligence: genetics, genes, and genomics. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 86 112-129 # ^ M. McGue, T. J. Bouchard Jr., W. G. Iacono, & D. T. Lykken (1993) Behavioral Genetics of Cognitive Ability: A Life-Span Perspective, in Nature, Nurture, and Psychology, by R. Plomin & G. E. McClearn (Eds.) Washington, DC: American Psychological Association # ^ R. Plomin, D. W. Fulker, R. Corley, & J. C. DeFries (1997) Nature, Nurture and Cognitive Development from 1 to 16 years: A Parent-Offspring Adoption Study Psychological Science 8 442–447 Or if you're feeling lazy, you could read the short version

You are correct in saying that studies show that environment plays a large role in determining intelligence differences for children. That's why I was very careful in saying that, by adulthood, there was no correlation between the intelligence levels of unrelated people who had been raised together. If you take children from unintelligent parents, and put them in really good homes, then as children they'll score better on standardized tests. But that environment bonus gradually wanes as they get older, even though they remain in that same positive environment. By adulthood, the I.Q. of the adoptive mother ceases to have any correlation with the children's I.Q.s, while the correlation with the biological mother's I.Q. is stronger than ever. In 1928, Trofim Denisovich Lysenko annonced that he'd developed a method to moisten and treat seeds to improve the later growth of crops. He made the Lamarckian claim these improved traits were passed onto subsequent generations. Lamarckian ideas had captured the imagination of Josef Stalin; who wanted to believe in a future unlimited by any sort of genetic ceiling. Stalin was quite pleased when Lysenko promised improved acricultural production through Lamarckian means. By 1937, Lysenko had become a member of the Supreme Soviet. Scientists who embraced Mendelian genetics were sent to gulags or executed by firing squads. By 1948, the theory of genetics had been officially banned as "bourgeois pseudoscience." Like Stalin and other members of the communist movement, you have politicized science in ways which understate the effect genetics have on human potential. I realize it's human nature to want to be inclusive, and to imagine anyone at all can be a top scientist or engineer if they just try hard enough. That's not the way the world really is. The laws of nature work a certain way, and wishful thinking on your part or within the leadership of the communist movement can't change those laws. Humanity never got anywhere by blinding itself to natural forces. Achievement comes when you combine a fanatical determination to see things as they are with an equally fanatical determination to make the world a better place.

You really shouldn't be drinking at work.

Thanks.

That's true, at least for unrestricted free agents who aren't tagged. The compensation for having a restricted free agent, or a designated franchise player, signed away by another team is calculated differently.

Funny stuff.

Environment plays a very weak role in determining intellectual differences You say environment is very important in determining differences in intelligence. That sentiment doesn't fit the facts. When two unrelated people are raised together, by adulthood there is zero correlation between their levels of intelligence. They ate the same meals. They were raised by the same people. They (generally) attended the same schools. Their environments were as close to the same as you could possibly hope to find. But there's no correlation between their test scores. Genetics strongly determine intelligence Identical twins raised apart show very strong levels of correlation on I.Q. test scores; and that correlation grows even stronger once they reach adulthood. Our ability to measure intelligence is high Your statements about intelligence tests display very little understanding of the field of psychometrics. I suggest you read up on tests involving reaction times, and how those results strongly correlate with results from more traditional aptitude tests. There is extensive literature and research supporting the validity of standardized aptitude tests. You should look into it. Selective breeding could reverse the present decline of the gene pool The idea that I consider an I.Q. test "100% foolproof" was pulled out of your anal orifice. I.Q. tests aren't perfect, but they don't need to be perfect to reverse the present degeneration of the gene pool.

I'm finding it increasingly difficult to believe you got the SAT score you say you got. Here are the exact same words you quoted, with the relevant sentence bolded. You missed the point of that first post completely, didn't you? Bungee Jumper (a.k.a. DC Tom) tried to argue a eugenics program wouldn't increase the average level of intelligence, because of regression toward the mean. Two people with I.Q.s of 140 would be expected to have children that were generally in, say, the 130s range. Over time, he felt this regression toward the population mean would cause the eugenics program to fail. The point of that first post was to show that if Bungee Jumper's line of reasoning was actually valid, it would undermine the basis for Darwinism. Just about all traits are subject to regression toward the mean. For example, very tall parents tend to have children that, while also tall, aren't as tall as their parents.

This from page 1 in my first post: I take it your alleged high score on the SAT wasn't due to strong success on the reading comprehension section.

Nobody here (other than Ramius) wants to discredit I.Q. tests. That'd be like saying 40 yard dash times are utterly meaningless because someone can run faster if they're well-rested than if they've just finished a marathon. European royalty was not selectively bred for any desirable genetic characteristic. Marriages were often arranged to cement alliances between nations; or were guided by other political considerations. You mention unwanted recessive traits that have resulted from excessive inbreeding. On the one hand that shows too small a variety in European royalty's gene pool; on the other hand it shows that selective breeding probably wasn't used to get rid of, say, hemophilia.

What you're saying is straightforward and quite obvious. Human beings have clearly reached a higher level of thought than has any animal. It's not just a difference in degree; it's a difference in kind. As you've alluded to, animals are incapable of the types of abstract thought that humans engage in. You shouldn't have had to go through all this work to prove something so obvious. Sometimes having a conversation with Bungee Jumper (a.k.a. DC Tom) is like trying to run a race when you're stuck in chest-high quicksand.

Good point about the I.Q. tests. I.Q. tests aren't perfect, but they're far better than Ramius would have you believe. Some people discredit I.Q. tests (and standardized aptitude tests in general) because they think they're smarter than their test scores indicate. Having known and worked with a few such people, I'm of the opinion the test scores are usually right. I'm not saying Ramius necessarily falls into that category, but it wouldn't come as a complete shock if he did.

There is a strong correlation (high 80s) between how well a person does on one I.Q. test, and how well that person will do on a second test. People who were sleep deprived (or whatever) the first time they took the test could always be allowed to retake it. You think you can't selectively breed for intelligence, but you're wrong. Natural selection is a far blunter instrument for identifying intelligent people than an I.Q. test. And yet, natural selection has resulted in some animals having progressively higher levels of intelligence; until finally the modern human appeared on the scene. Average brain size (after adjusting for body weight) has been going up in both mammals and birds for tens of millions of years. Natural selection can (and has) resulted in dramatic increases in intelligence. Selective breeding can do the same.

Right. Because it wasn't like the study's author described how research shows a strong correlation between intelligence and career choice. You tried to argue that this research doesn't apply to East Germany, because scientists were selected strictly on a political basis without any regard to underlying ability.

The relevant article used the assumption that the average East German scientist was generally smarter than, say, the average East German manual laborer. This assumption was so clearly reasonable you couldn't help but dispute it. Then the article used standardized test scores to identify the smartest children. It turned out the smartest children came from the smartest parents. The author felt this was because the smartest children inherited the M1/M1 genetic combination, while the least bright received the M2/M2 combination. That's standard-issue, basic, Mendelian genetics at work, not Lamarckian.

Every language in the world has a word which means "smart." The concept of intelligence may be abstract, but it is universal. Suppose a person were to take two separate intelligence tests. There's a strong correlation between his or her score on the first test and the second test. Intelligence tests measure something innate. You may be tempted to say that the only thing intelligence tests measure is how well someone does on intelligence tests, but the research indicates otherwise. A person's score on an IQ test is a strong predictor of a number of life outcomes, including income level, chance of being in jail, chance of being an unwed mother, etc. Whatever intelligence tests measure 1) is real, 2) is very relevant in determining life outcomes, and 3) is mostly due to genetics. If two nuclear physicists have children, the kids won't necessarily be nuclear physicists themselves, but they will almost certainly be much smarter than average. That's the power of Mendelaian genetics and selective breeding.