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From: mmm@cup.portal.com (Mark Robert Thorson)
Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng,sci.psychology
Subject: Re: Spelling and IQ (was: Effects of poor writing?)
Message-ID: <18956@cup.portal.com>
Date: 30 May 89 05:11:42 GMT
References: <750@cogsci.ucsd.EDU>
Organization: The Portal System (TM)
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It would be surprising if IQ did not correlate with spelling. Consider this
(quoted from BIAS IN MENTAL TESTING by Arthur Jensen):

"Intelligence test scores have been shown to have significant low to moderate
positive correlations with a variety of other variables, such as honesty
(Mussen, Harris, Rutherford, & Keasey, 1970);  non-academic attainment in
extra-curricular activities (Kogan & Pankove, 1974);  children's appreciation
of humor as judged from reponse to cartoons of varying subtlety and 
sophistication (Zigler, Levine, & Gould, 1966);  ability to solve anagrams
(Gavurin, 1967);  untrained musical aptitude (Wing, 1941);  speed of learning
a number of relatively complex (but not simple) motor skills (Noble, 1974);
susceptibility to certain optical illusions and various perceptual phenomena
(studies reviewed by Honigfeld, 1962); and amount of specific information
retained from viewing a television feature program, especially the incidental,
unemphasized bits of information (Nias & Kay, 1954)."

Jensen goes on to describe in detail a number of other correlates to IQ,
such as brain size, brain waves, height, obesity (negative correlate in
women), and near-sightedness.  The latter has a particularly strong positive
correlation.

That high-IQ people are inherently superior to the rabble is clearly 
demonstrated by the following quotations from the thoughts of Marilyn
Dos Savant (world's highest IQ person) printed in the May 28, 1989
San Jose Mercury-News (my sarcastic comments in []'s):

Q.  Do you believe a person would want to know when he or she will die?
                                                       --Anonymous
A.  I would.  Can you imagine receiving an envelope in the mail that you
knew contained that information and NOT opening it?  (Admittedly, you'd
sit and think down first.  But just think of the sheer joy of knowing.
Why, you could take up PARACHUTING if you wanted to!)

[Why, you could put a gun to your head and pull the trigger if you wanted to!]

Q.  Which is more important:  love or freedom?
                                    --Randall Jewell, Silver Spring, MD
A.  Freedom.  Otherwise, kids would never leave home.

[Love.  Otherwise, there wouldn't be any kids in the first place.]

Q.  Have you learned anything from being interviewed?
                                    --Joseph Fiallo, Sarasota, FL
A.  Don't insult the barber until after you've gotten up from the chair.

[I wonder what interviewer gave you that opinion?  Obviously someone who
doesn't have the appropriate amount of awe for the world's highest IQ person
(and former member of the National Security Council during the Nancy Reagan
administration).]