Average racial intelligences and why there is no Jewish conspiracy

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

What is your explanation for all these geniuses not joining Mensa? Isn't the ethnic stratification also correlated with an economic gap? What is the breakdown in field of study? Are any of the fields associated with spatial intelligence, like maybe engineering which requires both mathematical and spatial intelligence?

Membership in Mensa is not just a matter of qualification but a matter of interest, so I certainly wouldn't use it as the best evidence that a certain race or ethnic group is smarter than another.

Yet, that is what you were doing in the op. Now we see that there is definitely a "cultural" variable as well. Moreover, you seem to use the variable when it is consistent with your hypothesis but choose not to use it when it could alternatively explain the observations you choose to support your hypothesis.

For example, in American Mensa, other racial groups are fairly represented, but Asian Americans are underrepresented, given their higher average intelligence, underrepresented likely for cultural reasons (lack of interest).

I will ignore a number of assumptions there, but if a number of Asians joined, then the % of Mensa who identify as Jewish in the US would decline seriously.

The best evidence would be representative intelligence tests. If you are looking for evidence that Ashkenazi Jews really do have a high average intelligence, then I can provide it for you, if you like.

What am I looking for? I have asked you a number of questions throughout my posts and I have challenged you. I'd like you to address the issues already raised. One issue is the spatial intelligence of Ashkenazi allegedly being lower than average. If they are getting Nobel prizes in fields which require high spatial intelligence and they are winning world chess championships which also require high spatial intelligence it disagrees with your arguments about right-tail ends of intelligence distributions. You should go back to the questions and challenges posed in my posts and address these things.

 

[ApostateAbe]

Membership in Mensa is not just a matter of qualification but a matter of interest, so I certainly wouldn't use it as the best evidence that a certain race or ethnic group is smarter than another.

Yet, that is what you were doing in the op. Now we see that there is definitely a "cultural" variable as well. Moreover, you seem to use the variable when it is consistent with your hypothesis but choose not to use it when it could alternatively explain the observations you choose to support your hypothesis.

For example, in American Mensa, other racial groups are fairly represented, but Asian Americans are underrepresented, given their higher average intelligence, underrepresented likely for cultural reasons (lack of interest).

I will ignore a number of assumptions there, but if a number of Asians joined, then the % of Mensa who identify as Jewish in the US would decline seriously.

The best evidence would be representative intelligence tests. If you are looking for evidence that Ashkenazi Jews really do have a high average intelligence, then I can provide it for you, if you like.

What am I looking for? I have asked you a number of questions throughout my posts and I have challenged you. I'd like you to address the issues already raised. One issue is the spatial intelligence of Ashkenazi allegedly being lower than average. If they are getting Nobel prizes in fields which require high spatial intelligence and they are winning world chess championships which also require high spatial intelligence it disagrees with your arguments about right-tail ends of intelligence distributions. You should go back to the questions and challenges posed in my posts and address these things.

I can't explain the claimed lowness of spatial intelligence among Jews. "Spatial" intelligence is part of Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences. Though it is highly regarded among teachers, it is generally dismissed as pseudoscience among intelligence researchers for its lack of predictive validity. Wikipedia had four footnotes after the claim, but the claim did not come from any of those sources. Two of the sources predate Gardner's theory, and the other two sources are Richard Lynn, who knows better. General intelligence can be rightly broken into two components: verbal and mathematical, and Jews excel at both.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

I can't explain the claimed lowness of spatial intelligence among Jews.

Okay.

"Spatial" intelligence is part of Howard Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences.

Yes, but that does not necessarily mean that something functionally equivalent is not found in IQ tests.

Though it is highly regarded among teachers, ...

I agree. Gardner is required reading.

...it is generally dismissed as pseudoscience among intelligence researchers for its lack of predictive validity.

Is it?

Wikipedia had four footnotes after the claim, ...

That is true. They did.

...but the claim did not come from any of those sources.

Are you sure about that? Some of these things I imagine you have to pay to see the full paper. Did you check out the full text? Did you look at IQ score components themselves to see what was relevant to spatial intelligence?

Two of the sources predate Gardner's theory, ...

Does it matter if what is being tested is functionally equivalent to spatial intelligence?

...and the other two sources are Richard Lynn, who knows better.

So Richard Lynn does not mention anything equivalent to spatial intelligence?

General intelligence can be rightly broken into two components: verbal and mathematical, and Jews excel at both.

The most commonly used IQ test is Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale and that test breaks down testing and results into verbal and performance, not verbal and mathematical. Much of the performance IQ portion are related to spatial intelligence.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

Another type of IQ test: Woodcock–Johnson Tests of Cognitive Abilities
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodcock–Johnson_Tests_of_Cognitive_Abilities

contains specifically "Visual-Spatial Thinking."

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

... and the other two sources are Richard Lynn, who knows better.

Here you seem to be saying that Richard Lynn knows better than to use spatial intelligence in a paper.

Here is a paper where Richard Lynn is one of the authors. It not only mentions spatial ability which it relates to performance IQ but it also is about chess.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.2044-8295.1992.tb02437.x/abstract

The general intelligence and spatial abilities of gifted young Belgian chess players
Marcel Frydman1 and Richard Lynn2,*
Article first published online: 13 APR 2011
DOI: 10.1111/j.2044-8295.1992.tb02437.x
1992 The British Psychological Society

Thirty-three tournament-level young Belgian chess players aged 8 to 13 were tested with the French WISC (Wechsler Intelligence Scale for Children) The mean full scale IQ = 121, verbal IQ = 109 and performance IQ = 129. The results suggest that a high level of general intelligence and of spatial ability are necessary to achieve a high standard of play in chess. The high spatial ability of these young chess players suggested by the high performance IQs may go some way towards explaining why males tend to be more numerous than females among high-standard chess players.

Spatial ability is the dominating factor, mathematical ability is secondary. Verbal is there saying hello but it is almost insignificant. If you look at these numbers and how Ashkenazi allegedly perform on IQ tests, then you would expect Ashkenazi to be average: the math and verbal ability are pretty much cancelled out by the below average spatial ability.

 

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

To be complete...there is another chess intelligence study which finds no [or less] correlations with IQ components but instead correlation with practice.

So maybe Richard Lynn is wrong and there is some kind of cultural component to chess mastery.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289606001139

Intelligence

Volume 35, Issue 5, September–October 2007, Pages 457–470

Does chess need intelligence? — A study with young chess players
Merim Bilalić, Peter McLeod, Fernand Gobet

Although it is widely acknowledged that chess is the best example of an intellectual activity among games, evidence showing the association between any kind of intellectual ability and chess skill has been remarkably sparse. One of the reasons is that most of the studies investigated only one factor (e.g., intelligence), neglecting other factors relevant for the acquisition of chess skill (e.g., amount of practice, years of experience). The present study investigated the chess skill of 57 young chess players using measures of intelligence (WISC III), practice, and experience. Although practice had the most influence on chess skill, intelligence explained some variance even after the inclusion of practice. When an elite subsample of 23 children was tested, it turned out that intelligence was not a significant factor in chess skill, and that, if anything, it tended to correlate negatively with chess skill. This unexpected result is explained by a negative correlation between intelligence and practice in the elite subsample. The study demonstrates the dangers of focusing on a single factor in complex real-world situations where a number of closely interconnected factors operate.

 

[ApostateAbe]

I don't conflate "spatial ability" with "spatial intelligence," but in either case I am unfamiliar with the research that claims that Jews score lower. Sorry.

- - - Updated - - -

Thanks for the lead about the link between intelligence and chess. I have long been curious about it. Maybe I will purchase that study.

 

[Canard DuJour]

Chess is chewing gum for the mind.

 

[Elixir]

Chess is chewing gum for the mind.

Chewing gum is chess for the mandible.

 

[fromderinside]

Chess is chewing gum for the mind.

Chewing gum is chess for the mandible.

Mandible makes gum from chess.

 

[AdamWho]

It is interesting that such a claim would get you banned from a place like stormfront because I thought they liked quoting statistics.

In other places they seem to have a whole list of statistics showing some races are better than others (intelligence, crime rates, IQ,...) and if I remember correctly, they already acknowledge that Ashkenazi Jews have higher than average intelligence.

 

[GenesisNemesis]

White nationalists like to gloat about low average mental aptitude test scores for blacks and Hispanics. When I remind them of the high average scores for Jews and Orientals they accuse me of being a race traitor, say I hate whites, and so on.

And then you make comments about how you hate the "Negro race".