IQ

DOH!

On November 28 the American Enterprise Institute held a symposium on the persistent gap between the average IQ test scores of black and non-Hispanic white Americans. The question: Is the gap closing? The presenters at AEI were James Flynn, a philosopher who taught at the University of Otago in New Zealand, and Charles Murray, a scholar at AEI and the co-author of The Bell Curve. Flynn .. offered an anecdote in which he contrasted the attitudes of Chinese, Jewish and black families toward academic accomplishment. According to Flynn, Chinese children come home and sit down and do their homework and their parents help. In Jewish households there is a lot of screaming, but eventually the kids sit down and do their homework. In black families, a kid sits down to do his homework and Dad comes home and says, “Hey, why don’t we go out back and shoot a couple of baskets.” “Children can tell the difference in parental enthusiasm for sports versus books,” he noted. As a self-avowed socialist, Flynn is in favor of dramatically expanding all sorts of color-blind state interventions. For example, he wants government drop-in centers where parents of every race and class could bring their children for educational enrichment. He also said that he wanted to see more book clubs in the black community. Murray, on the other hand, does not believe that there is much evidence that government educational interventions beyond some reasonably adequate level can permanently boost IQ test scores. Murray’s preferred policy is to forget group averages and encourage private and public institutions to treat people as individuals.  [Closing the Black/White IQ Gap?] In my lifetime I've had my IQ measured from 115 to 160.  I had school counselors berate me for not performing at the top, and others who suggested a trade school might be a good option.  I've qualified for Mensa on the Wonderlic, and failed geometry.  My brain seems to have a rheostat which I have no control over. What does it all mean?  How the hell should I know - I'm running at 98 right now. That's enough to know that Murray is right, though.