Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!husc6!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!mailrus!ames!sunybcs!bingvaxu!vu0112 From: vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn) Newsgroups: sci.psychology Subject: Re: Hi-Q societies Message-ID: <1015@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu> Date: 30 Mar 88 02:58:54 GMT References: <7743@apple.Apple.Com-> <2042@mind.UUCP> Reply-To: vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu (Cliff Joslyn) Organization: SUNY Binghamton, NY Lines: 85 In article clong@topaz.rutgers.edu (Chris Long) writes: >In article <2042@mind.UUCP>, Eliot Handelman writes: >> Tata, sci.psychology. I've got better things to do than have discussions >> at this level. What really offends me about Eliot's posting and others that support the Hi-Q societies is the implication that there is a *linear* scale of intelligence, an absolute measure of intelligence (even if it is currently unknown or poorly formulated), and that it *really means* something to say that I am more intelligent than you (or vice versa). This blatantly ignores that thought has many forms and modalities, and that intelligence is not one thing but rather highly complex, with many different manifestations. It is easy to see how the other idea, combined with a bit of insecurity, can lead to the kind of arrogance, insularity, prejudice, and ultimately paranoia that I feel many of us sense in their postings. I'd like to relate my own experiences on this matter. In 4th grade I was given intelligence tests. Our teacher was asked to "point out the bright kids" to the suited white man from "the county." I recall quite vividly how some of us were selected, taken down to a special room, and with no explanation asked strange questions (you know, three different size pails of water, vocabulary, all the usual crap). I watched my interrogator make two kinds of marks: a plus most of the time, the occasional minus when I *knew* I didn't know. On this basis I spent grades 5-8 in a special education program for "gifted" people. My experiences were decidedly mixed. Our group was predominately male, no blacks, one or two orientals (Fairfax County Virginia is excessively affluent, but with significant minority populations). We were given a lot of time to play, do group projects, make up games, little formal reading or math. We did as little as possible to get the assignments done. Things were couched in that early 70's edu-speak where there is never a right answer. Cutesy algebra was snuck in in 5th grade, group theory in 7th. Nevertheless I got a C- in real algebra in 8th grade. Looking back on it, I can see that even given that extra training I still had *no idea* what a variable was! We were given time and attention, but no wisdom, no discipline. I still feel that lack today, and try to (over?) compensate. The worst thing, and where I can relate this to Eliot's posting, was the attitudes instilled in us. We were called different things. Before I got in the program, we were called "superior learners" (what an offensive phrase!), derisively as "soopies" by our "inferior" school-mates, then finally "gifted and talented". Many of us revelled in our privelege, and fancied ourselves super-beings deserving of absolute praise no matter our performance. Our insularity was total. We were removed from our local community, from real ("normal", "inferior") people. We shared all our classes together, making up perhaps 20% of our school population. We rode the bus together every day, ten of us 45 minutes each way. Our homes were separated by long car rides which our doting parents eagerly gave us. Our personality disorders were amplified by the group, so much so that I know some of us will never succeed in real society. When I got to high school (there was no high school program), while my curiosity and intellectual ego were undoubtedly enhanced, I was at a severe social disadvantage which I'm still overcoming. I don't intend to indict special programs in general. No doubt they can be done better than mine was. No doubt also I can partially credit my subsequent academic and intellectual success to my "special training." What I want to point out is that ELITISM CORRUPTS, and intellecutal elitism cuts a person in half, saying that your brain is a valuable commodity, more important perhaps than your person. It is terribly easy to objectify intellect, separating it from its subject, thereby placing a false value on it and its holder. This process leads to belief in that value by the subject, and subsequently to arrogance and paranoia. I recall watching the Bill Moyers piece about evil on PBS last night, and listening to a Jew condemm the highly educated doctors and lawyers of the 3rd Reich who provided the social and institutional glue for the slaughter. Belief in one's personal power and superiority is probably the most corrupting influence on a person, especially in an individualistic and competitive society which reinforces and rewards such perceived power and superiority. I fear that secret caballs where self-styled geniuses scratch and claw for membership and dominance provide a seductive breeding ground for the kind of intellectual absolutism which is a hallmark of evil. Rationale without emtion is empty; intellect without wisdom is perilous. O----------------------------------------------------------------------> | Cliff Joslyn, Professional Cybernetician | Systems Science Department, SUNY Binghamton, New York | vu0112@bingvaxu.cc.binghamton.edu V All the world is biscuit shaped. . .