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posted by cmn32480 on Thursday November 02 2017, @05:57PM   Printer-friendly
from the maybe-they-only-surveyed-the-nimnobs dept.

Why can we talk about PISA results, comparing the performance of students in school, but we are not allowed to talk about differences in IQ? Bring this subject up, and you are immediately accused of racism. And yet. And yet, if there are substantial differences in intellectual capability, might this not explain some of the world's problems?

An update of a massive "study of studies" is underway; this article summarizes the work to date, and provides links to the work in progress. A quick summary of the answers to the questions no one dares ask:

  • Eastern Asia (Japan, China): IQ around 105
  • Europe/North America: IQ around 98
  • Middle East: IQ around 85
  • Africa: IQ around 70

In the first instance, it doesn't even matter why there are differences. They may be genetic, or disease related, or nutrition related, or something else. If these differences are real (and the evidence is pretty strong that they are), then we need to deal with them. Imagine if the low IQs in Africa turn out to be fixable - what would the impact be, if we could raise the IQ of an entire continent by 30 points?!

Sticking our collective heads in the sand, because the topic is not PC, is not going to solve any problems.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @07:50PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday November 02 2017, @07:50PM (#591292)

    Of course. But to be fair there is a significant part of population in China that never gets to take this test. Think about people from rural China who pull their pants down on a crowded train and shit right on the floor thinking it is OK, because where they are from they shit anywhere they want (yes China, not India, although obviously that happens there too).