| el jefe |
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I thoroughly enjoyed reading Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" and have recommended it to many others. But I was looking at it again today and reminded of the untruth at its very foundation. At the beginning of the book--literally, the second page of the Prologue--he says: "He [Yali, a New Guinean friend of Diamond's] and I knew perfectly well that New Guineans are on the average at least as smart as Europeans." This is simply false. The average IQ in those European countries is around 100 or a little lower; the average in Papua New Guinea is around 85 or a little lower. With Google, this is easy to confirm nowadays. But even in the pre-Google days that Diamond was writing the book, the data were pretty readily available to a scholar like him. So either he *knew* he was writing falsely, in which case he just plain lied; or he *should* have known that his statement of equal intelligence was false, in which case his research on this point was culpably shoddy. |
| also read the book |
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Then let's take a European with an IQ of 100 (the "average" European) and drop him in New Guinea in the middle of the forest. Due to his intelligence, he'll be able to survive, right? You must've missed the chapter where Diamond discusses the intelligence that is gained by knowing one's environment and how to survive in it. |
| tupperFan |
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Intelligence is a latent variable, for which IQ tests are a mere proxy |
| agip |
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IQ tests are nonsense. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect test scores have been increasing steadily in developed nations - project that back, and the average citizen in 1776 had an IQ of around 10. People seem to be getting better at taking tests, that's all. |
| Tinfoil |
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Or the average person is getting smarter due to better nutrition and better education.
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| diamond fan |
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I agree--it really sounds like you missed his point entirely. Perhaps you should read the book again. We all have very specialized cognitive skills that are shaped by our environment. The point of any assessment tool is to predict an outcome..what does an IQ test say about a New Guinean? That he probably won't do as well in a European educational system. It says little about his ability to survive in the forest, which seems to be more relevant to a New Guinean than it would be to a European. |
| el jefe |
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Humans are smart, and New Guineans are human. They've (individually and as a culture) *had* to be smart to survive in their environment. But that's pretty much true of most peoples. My point is that the purpose of Diamond's book is to explore Yali's question: how it is that Europeans have more "cargo" ("stuff," basically) than New Guineans and other so-called primitive cultures do. Diamond brings in some ingenious and thought-provoking possibilities, and they make the book a pleasure to read. But for him to ignore--worse, to *gainsay*--the fact of Europeans' higher (average) intelligence, and not consider that as another possible reason they have more "cargo," is dishonest and misleading. |
| agip |
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Read the wikipedia article to which I linked - do you really think the average american in 1932 had an IQ of 80? clearly multiple things are going on here. _________________ [/quote] |
| Tinfoil |
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Yes. Your grandparents were idiots. [/quote][/quote] |
| MAAANNNNN |
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Humans are smart, and New Guineans are human. They've (individually and as a culture) *had* to be smart to survive in their environment. But that's pretty much true of most peoples. My point is that the purpose of Diamond's book is to explore Yali's question: how it is that Europeans have more "cargo" ("stuff," basically) than New Guineans and other so-called primitive cultures do. Diamond brings in some ingenious and thought-provoking possibilities, and they make the book a pleasure to read. But for him to ignore--worse, to *gainsay*--the fact of Europeans' higher (average) intelligence, and not consider that as another possible reason they have more "cargo," is dishonest and misleading.[/quote] Ya you are way off. Read what people before me have written. And what's this "fact of Europeans' higher intelligence." You sound like a bit of a racist, or just ignorant, actually it is probably both. |
| bmi overweight |
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I guess I'll reiterate what MANNNN said - you (el jefe) are assuming the conclusion in your argument. Additionally, while it is true that the difference in IQ scores exist, this does not indicate a difference in innate intelligence. The true test of this would be to raise a New Guinean in a European culture (i.e. adopted parents), and ideally vice versa as well (i.e. European child raised in New Guinea by New Guinean parents). Then repeat this at least 30 times and now test for IQ, keeping the test constant. Only under those quasi-experimental conditions can we begin to compare IQ scores in order to show evidence for some supposed innate difference in intelligence between groups of people. No study that I know of has every used such a methodology, which is part of the reason why well-reasoned people dismiss such IQ comparisons offhand. The null hypothesis is that there is no difference in IQ, and until a WELL-DESIGNED, fully crossed (from a statistical standpoint) study rejects this hypothesis, any such comparison is fundamentally flawed. These comments are to be interpreted in addition to the well-known problems associated with IQ tests, already mentioned by several previous posters. |
| Middle Professor |
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Jefe - you have missed the point again, which is succinctly summarized by "Diamond Fan". You cannot equate IQ with intelligence. IQ is not nonsense; It has its functions in the culture in which it was developed. It's a pretty good predictor of success in a typical western economy, for example (but so is a simple vocabulary test). While intelligence is necessary for native New Guineans living in the forest, IQ doesn't measure this kind of intelligence or it measures it poorly. So IQ is not THE measure of intelligence. Its a measure of the cognitive skills that makes one successful in a modern western economy. Different environments require different sets of cognitive skills. |
| assdafdas |
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The problem with projecting the flynn effect back in time is that you don't KNOW whether that's valid or not. If, for example, the Flynn effect is chiefly due to better childhood health, then there would not be a significant change in IQ over time before the advent of vaccines and antibiotics. Likewise for nutrition or other environmental factors. It's like saying "the number of razor blades on the average men's facial razor increased 500% from 1975 to 1995. That means in 2015 we'll be using razors with 25 blades!" |
| kibitzer |
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I only mentioned the Europeans because Diamond (and Yali) did. In fact, having spent time in SEAsia and the islands of the Western Pacific, I can say that the historical predominance of ethnic Chinese, throughout the region, may be even more striking than that of the Europeans. And I can suggest, as Diamond does, that there are many factors involved. But to clearly suggest, as he does, that (average) intelligence IS NOT/CANNOT be a factor, and need not be considered, is simply wrong. Racist? Possible but unlikely, given my "Baskin-Robbins" family and my own mixed-race background--which, however, doesn't blind me to the fact (yes, fact) that there are, on average, differences between the various peoples of the Earth. Ignorant? Possible AND likely, but not about the facts that some peoples have higher IQs (on average) than others (see, e.g., http://www.raventest.net/averageiqbycountry.html ); or that IQ is a good measurement of intelligence (see, e.g., http://www.psychpage.com/learning/library/intell/mainstream.html ). In any case, if you could help erase my ignorance, I'd appreciate it. For further discussion re Diamond's dishonesty (or at least sloppiness), I can recommend http://mangans.blogspot.com/2009/05/diamonds-guinea-foul.html , which I (literally) just found. I'm not familiar with this blogger, though, so apologies in advance if HE turns out to be a racist... |
| el jefe |
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I also just found this, which I hadn't known about--Diamond's being sued for libel: http://www.azcentral.com/ent/celeb/articles/2009/04/22/20090422jared.html Anyone know how that came out? |
| cargo-less |
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Look at this this way. If a huge catastrophe comes to the earth, who has a better chance to survive, those that need a lot of "cargo" or those who do not. The answer is obvious. Take away Starbucks, McDonalds, Walmart and other such cargo providing companies and nearly all Americans would die. What would you eat? Where would get gasoline? American / Euro IQ has nothing to do with real world, survival, intelligence.
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| bmi overweight |
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kibitzer - see my post above about the using IQ to measure differences in innate intelligence between groups. As I say there, only a fully crossed, 2x2 design can show this. No such study exists, to my knowledge. |
| Clifford Diffley |
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Starbucks, McDonalds and Walmart IS real world. What makes you think it isn't? |
| el jefe |
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Yali wants to know why some other people have more stuff. Diamond writes a book, in an attempt to answer the question. He considers many factors that might *contribute* to the answer. He deliberately dismisses differential intelligence as a factor, by making a false statement about the difference. That's dishonest. I'm not sure how your post directly addresses this, cargo-less, but in any case I think what might happen in your hypothetical scenario is a little less "obvious" than you suggest. Specifically, if a "huge catastrophe" comes to Earth, it's not only a question of who "needs" a lot of cargo; who *has* a lot of it, and knows how to use it, is also important. For instance, those with more stuff might be better prepared (in general) to weather such an occasion; they might be better able to predict or detect the (specific) catastrophe when it's just starting, and take appropriate safety measures; they might be better able to warn others, and secure the help of others, when the catastrophe hit. It's a little hard to be sure *how* things would work out--a lot of "huge catastrophes" are possible--but I don't think the "winners" in such a scenario are as obvious as you make out. |
| your legs |
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+1 Cultural differences. The ease of multiple choice tests for Europeans is akin to ease of making fire without matches for New Guineans. See how long it takes a European to start the fire! |