Path: utzoo!utgpu!watmath!iuvax!mailrus!ames!uhccux!lee
From: lee@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (Greg Lee)
Newsgroups: comp.ai
Subject: Re: Genetics and IQ
Message-ID: <4537@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu>
Date: 9 Aug 89 23:34:16 GMT
References: <3229@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>
Organization: University of Hawaii
Lines: 30

From article <3229@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU>, by geb@cadre.dsl.PITTSBURGH.EDU (Gordon E. Banks):

" ... If problem X is such a serious problem that its solution promotes
" survival of the individual, then intelligence will be selected for.
" Obviously this occurs, otherwise, we'd all still be Chimps, no?  Why do you
" think we became intelligent in the first place?

A uniformitarian argument:  intelligence was once selected for,
therefore it is the presumption that it is now being selected for.  Ok.
But what if special intelligence never was selected for?  It may have
been manual dexterity that was the advantage, and intelligence got a
free ride on the extra control mechanisms needed for dexterity.  (This
is a naive statement of a view proposed by the anthropologist Sherry
Washburn some time back.)

" ...  In some societies, the
" intelligencia have been celibate priests, hardly conducive to
" selecting intelligence. ...

It's pretty naive to assume the "intelligentsia" has higher
intelligence, isn't it?

"   What is more, smarts are very
" highly valued by Jewish culture.  Jewish women have traditionally
" preferred a clever man to a jock for a husband.

Even adopting this silly assumption that jocks aren't intelligent,
we don't come to the point until we find how many children
they have.
			Greg, lee@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu