What Good is it Knowing About Differences in Population Average IQ?

One relevant missing curve in the graphic above is the IQ distribution for Ashkenazi Jews. A recent afternoon event at AEI [see video] looked at the topic of Jewish IQ. Slate magazine covers that event here.

It is becoming clearer that population differences in average IQ exist, and may play an important role in differences in achievement. Recently, esteemed genetics Nobelist James Watson was forced to resign his post at Cold Spring Harbor, and had many public appearances canceled, as a result of his public statement expressing pessimism about the future of Africa as a result of low population average IQ there.

Many sensitive people fear the scientific study of population IQ differences, and try to discourage others from taking the idea seriously. Whether or not they believe it, they declare: "IQ tests are worthless" "intelligence is undefinable" "there is no such thing as 'race'" "this whole topic is racist" etc etc. Other persons perhaps less sensitive and more thoughtful ask: "what good is knowing that one group has higher average IQ than another group?"

The latter question is worth looking at. The reason scientists and others take the trouble to distinguish (discriminate) between one thing and another--to determine differences between things, classes, groups, people etc--is to explain things that are not explicable otherwise, and to more effectively plan future action. If society is ruled by liberal ideas such as "equality before the law" "equality of opportunity" etc. and is populated by people who generally wish to alleviate widespread hardship and suffering, the society will be better able to make policy to alleviate hardship and suffering with the benefit of better knowledge of reality.

Imagine a global government, based on the above liberal ideals, that is disturbed by the perpetual suffering and poverty in the nation of Haiti. For the government to institute a sustainable and effective policy of reducing poverty and suffering in Haiti, the global entity would require the very best information as to the reasons for the very long term poverty within Haiti. Clearly basing a policy on incorrect causes of Haiti's condition would almost certainly result in no sustained improvement in Haiti's condition, while at the same time wasting substantial global resources that might have gone toward solving problems.

Intentionally not studying a problem to understand its foundations, is a clear invitation to erroneous explanations, and wasteful faux "solutions." When science is manacled by political correctness and research censorship, nonsense explanations run rampant.

Wise administrators need the best information available to plan the optimal policies for their institutions and bureaucracies. While humane societies institute means to assure equal opportunities under the law, they also understand the importance of meritocracy in preserving the relative competitiveness and prosperity of their society. Humaneness is not a suicide pact. If well-meaning policies are later found to be based upon false premises, they should be discontinued in favour of policies based upon the best available scientific knowledge. Simply replacing societal policies of racial discrimination with other societal policies of discrimination--merely shuffling the favoured and disfavoured a bit--is an absurdist approach to achieving justice.

Trying to achieve proportional representation of a population group within a profession that is generally acknowledged to require an intellectual aptitude that eliminates almost all members of that population group from consideration, is obviously a futile project. Far better to allow each person to discover his/her own niche--independent of population/ethnic/gender grouping.

Understanding the aptitude distribution curves for each population group does not give any group an unfair advantage. But it does provide explanations for discrepancies in representation that are based upon falsifiable science, rather than ideological cant.

People who prefer to base policy upon ideological cant will obviously prefer not to look at these questions scientifically. They will use whatever rhetorical mechanisms within reach to close debate and declare their point of view the only possible POV worth considering. This type of person has controlled much of the academy, the media, and many government bureaucracies for decades now. How long these professional ideologues can maintain their disproportionate control of public discourse remains to be seen.

It is worth knowing about population mean aptitude differences to help explain differences in achievement of different population groups. There is no one metric that determines superiority or inferiority of groups--except in terms of that one metric. Different population groups excel at different things. Perhaps when society finally takes an honest look at population differences, it can at the same time look at the strengths of every population group.

Even children understand that most people have strengths and weaknesses. It is time that society acknowledged the same--taking account of statistical spread--about population groups.