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Chris K. N.'s avatar

Whatever turns out to be true about group differences in any trait, I do think we really need to adjust the emotional valence of the concept of "intelligence".

Especially among the college-educated elite, intelligence is often talked about as if it has some moral value. As if intelligent people are somehow more valuable, and less intelligent people should be pitied. There's a contemptible attitude right below the surface. (I suspect it's a form of narcissism that will come to an uncomfortably abrupt end when AI trounces us at more of the little games we play to show how much smarter we are than each other.)

Someone once asked me a question – a little thought experiment – that forced me to think in a new way about how important I think intelligence is. I don't know where the question is originally from, but others may find it as interesting and useful as I did:

Imagine a scale from 0 to 100 points for each of the three traits intelligence, grit, and emotional intelligence. When your child is born, you get 200 points to distribute among those traits as you see fit.

So you'd need 300 points to max out your child on all the traits, but you only have enough points to get 2/3 of the way there. How would you divvy up the points, to best prepare your designer child for the life ahead?

Would you top up intelligence, at the cost of the other traits, or would you trade some of it away for above average grit or higher EQ?

What if you only get 150 points to distribute? 250?

What if you add other traits, like creativity, courage, honesty, or athleticism to the mix?

What if one of your highly valued traits was fixed at or below average, how would you compensate in the others?

For me, playing around with this question really made me acutely aware of how many different things I value in people. While I certainly think intelligence is important, I would happily sacrifice some of it for other good things in life.

Realizing that took away a lot of the discomfort I felt at the thought of group differences in intelligence. We are all such a soup of different traits, and when it comes to most of them, we are entirely unremarkable. In that mix, a single trait doesn't matter much at all – it's the combination, and all the ways in which we are different from each other, that make us interesting, unique, and able to add value that others can't.

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Notes from the Under Dog L.'s avatar

While I have two chapters to go in Facing Reality, it still seems reasonable to say that Murray isn’t arguing that we have to accept black people as capable mainly of “grunt work” — the purpose seems to explain that racism is not the reason why we don’t have more black physicists. He seems to be asserting that the assumption of racism underpinning this — and forcing people into positions for which they don’t possess the acumen — will do more harm than good.

It would be beneficial to study what caused the rise and subsequent fall of IQ scores in the black population after the 70s. Perhaps Murray would take this on.

On another note, having grown up in a mostly white suburb outside Chicago, I can say that most people did humble work — even the more intelligent among them. Perhaps what we need to adjust is our attitude about work and it’s meaning and value to society. The black nurses at my grandfather’s hospice performed a far more valuable service than most professors I know.

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