Historical Variability in Heritable General Intelligence: Its Evolutionary Origins and Socio-Cultural Consequences - Couverture souple

Woodley, Michael A.; Figueredo, Aurelio Jose

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1908684267 ISBN 13 : 9781908684264

Editeur : The University of Buckingham Press, 2013

Synopsis

It is easy for us to believe that as a society we are getting smarter, at least as measured by IQ tests. This supposed improvement, the Flynn Effect, suggests that each generation is brighter than the last.

If this improvement in intelligence is real we should all be much, much brighter than the Victorians. However, the researchers of this ground-breaking study find the reverse to be true- the Victorians were cleverer than us! IQ tests may be effective at picking out the brightest, but they are not reliable benchmarks of performance over more than a century.

Historical Variance records the exploration of the Flyyn effect hypothesis, which included the use of high-quality instruments to measure simple reaction times (a recognised predictor of intelligence) in a meta-analytic study.

The conclusions are very sobering: far from speeding up, we are slowing down. A decline in general intelligence (a loss equivalent to about 14 IQ points) since Victorian times may have resulted from the presence of dysgenic fertility. These findings, as detailed in Historical Variance, strongly indicate that the Victorians were substantially cleverer than we are today...

A propos du livre

Revue de presse

Increasing numbers of people have a sense that Western civilization peaked some decades ago and is now in decline. By detailed historical analysis of the rate of breakthroughs related to intelligence, Woodley and Figueredo here provide the most rigorous argument as to what is going on and trace the causes back to a down-turn in first the proportion, then the absolute numbers of creative geniuses which began around 1850. They paint a bleak picture of a world in which the evolutionary success of individuals is relentlessly driving-down the fitness of modern societies. --Bruce Charlton

Woodley and Figueredo have written a stunning monograph proposing that selection on intelligence within and between human groups works in opposing directions. Between group competition, especially in the context of hard times, favors groups with high genotypic IQ, especially innovators with IQs beyond 140 or so. Easier times relax this selection within groups leading to genotype IQ decline. They also propose that IQ responds to environmental change, the well-known Lynn-Flynn effect , but that these changes are not changes in genotypic IQ. They test their hypothesis with historical data on innovations in science and elsewhere. They paint with a broad stroke, refreshing in a work on IQ. We are forced to think about, for example, the ecology of Europe during the little ice age and its consequences for cognitive evolution. They work firmly in a tradition with people like W.D. Hamilton, Gregory Clark, Richard Lynn, and many others. --Prof. Henry Harpending, University of Utah

Présentation de l'éditeur

The Victorians were cleverer than us! It is easy for us to believe that we are getting brighter, at least as measured by IQ tests. This improvement, called the Flynn Effect, suggests that each generation is brighter than the last. This might be due to improved living standards: better food, health and education - or perhaps even thanks to the influence of the internet and new technology. But if this apparent improvement in intelligence is real we should all be much, much brighter than the Victorians.

The researchers of this ground-breaking study find the reverse to be true. IQ tests may be effective at picking out the brightest, but they are not reliable benchmarks of performance over more than a century. By means of using high-quality instruments to measure simple reaction times (a recognised predictor of intelligence) in a meta-analytic study, the researchers tested the hypothesis that the Victorians, whose era was marked by an explosion of innovation and genius, were more creative and intelligent than modern Western populations.

The conclusions are very sobering: far from speeding up, we are slowing down. A decline in general intelligence (a loss equivalent to about 14 IQ points) since Victorian times may have resulted from the presence of dysgenic fertility. These findings strongly indicate that the Victorians were substantially cleverer than we are today.

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: The University of Buckingham Press
• Date d'édition: 2013
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1908684267
• ISBN 13: 9781908684264
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 288
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
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