Why does Saletan insist on writing about science when he doesn't understand science? Why did a perfectly good political writer make a pathetic joke out of himself?

To echo an earlier comment, Slate has gone woefully downhill lately.

I agree.

Saletan also seems to have an un-natural preoccupation with intelligence. His article on Jewish intelligence discussions at AEI was not a great article either. I find him to be a complete joke and a liability rather than an asset.

His defense of Watson is comic and he does so to bolster his point that a Nobel Prize winner in the life sciences, the discoverer of DNA no less, is intellectually advanced and so less probably wrong on this idea of racially differentiated intelligence.

Watson stole a third of a Nobel Prize that actually belonged to Rosalind Franklin. This he probably did more for misogynistic reasons, a man as a product of his times. Can anyone give credibility to a man who would steal intellectual capital from a woman and claim it as his own.

This is only one objection to Saletan's article. His article and his references are replete with contestable ideas and data.

Didn't Einstein have a small very small head?

Overall size was about the same, but it was 15% wider as I understand it. From this, some people have inferred that intelligence might have something to do with brain shape and size after all.

Kaiser, I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'm curious about your own ability to comment on scientific writting. You may have even done this already, but if you haven't, would you mind providing something more specific than a diatribe?

take care.

I agree, Saletan has junk science.

But so far most of these neocons don't mind lying through thier teeth! They are cunning, and they are going for certain people susceptible to their cunning misinformation, in this case, racists, they are trying to give the racists some cover to hide behind...and perhaps give themselves some votes they might otherwise not get?

Most of the writing you see on television or read in the papers is total junk, even INSANE junk...and yet and still, where I live and work, most of these lambs being led to the slaughter slurp it up like candy and spout it 24/7, including the fascination with celebrities.

I don't know why, I never have, but most of them are deeply angry people, and narcissistic at the same time, a Repuglican combination, if you ask me (whereas the angry among the Dems out here usually dispise themsleves).

spiker:

Didn't Einstein have a small very small head?

I don't remember anything about the size of his head, but I do remember reading something about how when his brain was weighed it was below average. Those doing the measuring expected his brain to be significantly heavier.

From this, some people have inferred that intelligence might have something to do with brain shape and size after all.

I just finished reading wikipedia (and some other references) on it and the differences in shape were attributed to his being able to think visually and not necessarily smarter. Second, it seems he had a high proportion of glial cells in a a part of the brain associated with the type of thinking he did. Was he born that way or did he become that way via exercise as it were?

I thought Einstein was short and from pictures I don't see him to have an OJ Simpson scaled head so it is hard for me to believe he had a bigger skull let alone brain than what was average in his time. And it was probably a bit smaller.

He says this topic needs more discussion, not less. I agree.

In the future when we genetically modify babies we are going to have to know the genetic basis for intelligence. That way we can change babies to be smarter. (I doubt many will opt for making their babies stupid.)

It is going to happen. It is coming soon. People who bury their heads in the sand are going to be left behind.

It is going to happen. It is coming soon. People who bury their heads in the sand are going to be left behind.

They were going to "cure cancer" 30 years ago and then 20 and then 10. We still have cancer. It is highly treatable but it hasn't been irradicated.

What man knows about the biological sciences is very small. They are still discovering what they don't know. You can only hope that as these scientist plod along blindly they don't step on a bioligical land mine that could blow up in all of our faces.

"...think visually and not necessarily smarter."

In my mind, "smart" applies to ability of cognition, of which there are more than one form. Might you not say this proportional difference (ie-"15% wider, etc.") potentially made Einstein "smarter" at visual thinking?

I'm not saying I understand the finer points (or the "less-fine" ones) but it seems to me some information might indicate there are distinct realms of genetic advantage. When I read the "appology" of the scientist in question, I thought it was clear he wasn't saying the forms of intelligence which he thinks might be racially linked are in any way indicative of worth...in other words, that it's not a matter of better-than or worse-than, but rather a matter of simply being different; not unlike the fact that people of African decent are somewhat prone to sicle-cell anemia, but are also less prone to malaria (if I recall correctly from my old anthropology class). Apply such genetic facts to the realm of brain formation and it doesn't seem far-fetched (to this lay-person) to suggest some genes affect the way we think and that race (an ambiguous, but relatively useful concept) might have some affect on it.

Personally, I have a hard time putting much faith in "IQ" as a measure of "intelligence," so I understand the skepticism so many folks have had. I tend to see "IQ" as largely a socio-economic effect; not a genetic/racial one...I also think greater care should have been taken in the expression of his findings. It seems highly unintelligent to forget the social climate when discussing something as charged as race-related issues...particularly when you know racists WILL greatfully adopt the rhetoric that "[Africans have less of an IQ than Europeans]" (though I'm sure many will somehow forget that Asians and Jews seem to be more intelligent by the same study).

...my two bits.

Take care.

All very reasonalbe :-).

Among several points I'd make I'll just make this one. Asians seem to me to develop physically (body and brain) sooner than whites. They are more coordinated sooner, are more aware of their surroundings sooner, etc. (this is purely anecdotal). But then once both the Asian and the Caucasians have finished developing, except for the time advantage, they seem to be equal in all measures to me. I get by this personal experience because it seems more real to me than IQ tests.