Why Jews are smarter (as a group) than most groups.

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I've long suspected this to have been the case. I'm sorry to see that it turns out to have been true.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Sure, the hunk gets the dainty little woman. And, vice-versa. But, will the resulting daughter also be little and dainty?

Yah, a small dainty mother could just well result in a small, dainty man, and a big, muscular father can result in a huge, muscular daughter. In fact I've seen many real world examples of this.

I've even seen it in families where intelligence is concerned as well. There's one sibling that's an absolute dumb f**k who live in a trailer park with a criminal record (btw, I live in a trailer), there's the average ones, and then there's the smart, responsible sibling who everyone looks up to. I don't even think its all strictly genetics either, because I notice its the older sibling who tends to be the smartest and most well off. It could be that they had more attention and were used to having more responsibilities than the younger brothers and sisters.

Isaac was chased from well to well out of jealousy that his methods of agriculture and the ways he conducted his keep was more advanced and elevated then the surrounding tribesman. The philistines became very jealous of him, and his wealth and stocked up all of the wells he had dug and told him to go away. The torah acknowledged early this problem of the Jew coming into an area, does very well, is found to be a threat and a source of envy, and gets kicked out under the guise that you have succeeded "at our expense", as the torah account states. Instead of learning from the Jews how to do it better, they kick them out or kill them.

The torah is far more advanced then most text's in 2012, and certainly more advanced then most texts pre 1999, 1899, 1799, and most likely 2099 for precisely the reasons you state, and you have to believe that this early start they had 3000 years ago in logic and reason and their inclusiveness as a group had to have lead to the genetic prowess that Jews now carry.

There influence in the arts, culture, sciences is quite immense considering they are only 25 million of them. They are a deeply religious people, especially as humanists and atheists and left of center movements.

The first few chapters of b'rayshis (Genesis) and their account of how the earth came to be is pure late bronze age mythology. Even so, the ethics embedded in Torah was far superior to any of the surrounding nations and even today they are pretty much the Gold Standard.

Honest. The Earth is far older than 5273 years.

ruveyn

which is fine, the values communicated in it are far more elevated then any creation story ever made, and the revolution in human thinking that the very first sentence communicates is revolutionary today, the anti-pagan polemics, our relationship to this unseeable demander and giver of ethics, our relationship between the sexes and to animals and our role in this world, this unseeable's relationship to the natural world, its endless. A 3000 year old bronze-age myth? Absolutely, but the key is to remember what everyone else was thinking at the time, and by any way you measure it, this is far more advanced then anything that has come 3000 years after it, I mean look at just what most of the world was thinking just 500 years ago. Nothing has changed human thinking more then these five books of moses.

True. but the male of the species do not have to inherit characteristics of the female. If natural selection prefers dainty woman and muscular men that is what will come about. It is possible for a race to develope the daintiest of woman and the most muscular of men.

I suspect that ruveyn is right. One thing that I have learned over the years is that "raw talent" is almost never the limiting factor for a person. It's usually either work ethic, habits or experience. The same is probably true for groups as well.

Even if there is a substantial "raw intelligence" gap between groups, it would be a very bad idea to talk about it a lot. It would be bad for the
"intelligent" groups because they might fall into the traps of elitism or complacency, and it would be bad for the "dumb" groups because they might falsely believe that intelligence is their limiting factor and never reach their potential.

Not to get off subject, but yesterday, I got notice that this thread no longer existed. Finding it alive and well, I obviously had been misinformed.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

I like how ruveyn's view that being born a Jew increases your chances to be a scientist contradicts his other view that free will is a fact and you make your whole life. Hah!

Interesting, too, are the occasional Black and White twins

http://www.therundown.tv/headlines/just ... kin-color/

http://www.cbsnews.com/video/watch/?id=4695260n

Have you ever heard of conditional probability? Of Bayes Theorem?

ruveyn

I would have accept that the premise is accurate, which I have no basis for checking.

I think the point being is the Jewish people aren't in fact well defined by ethnicity, or race, despite the myth, which modern genetics has debunked. There is some credence to background, environment, culture improving things inter-generationally, perhaps.

In term of proportionality, I know that Asian do better on the IQ tests, but there is more to it than that, it does present itself in a different way.

From Jewish clients, I have it is fair to say that many of them are average. It is difficult to know what is being argued, that as a proportion there are more top performer (which are rarer by nature), or overall they produce smarter than average people.

There a simplistic assumption that intelligence equals more productivity. In fact it is much more complex relationship in civilization, with multiple roles needed to support it.

Have you ever heard of logical consequences of claims?

You now claim that probabilities varies between groups. If the probabilities vary, then the only sort of free will is one in which some arbitrarily get more free will than others. But that is a contradiction - It is the same as no free will at all.

If we assume that if you are born in Bach's family you are more likely to have music talent than if you are born in family. Then where's the free will exactly? So many people lost the race to become a great musician before being born? You are the one bringing "culture" as something that can drastically determine your future. It seems to contradict free will altogether.

Of course, you can attempt to claim that varying conditional probabilities is not the same as denying free will. But then you would be going against that guy called ruveyn who told me that me claiming that it is possible to reduce the probability of individuals turning into criminals I am "implicitly denying free will".

So, I think that is a important thing to notice. If you get to claim that having a culture like the Jewish one will improve your chances of winning a Nobel prize, then I get to claim that having a culture with easy access to education and welfare will improve your chances of not being a criminal. It is easy!

But how does this dispute ruveyn's original claim in any way?

Jewish heritage being a predictor of scientific achievements and education and welfare being a predictor of criminality are not mutually exclusive.

I disagree with the initial description of a "breeding program."

Jews have traditionally valued education. Fathers were more likely to hand their daughters off to "intelligent" suitors rather than "stupid" suitors, and education strongly supported the intellect factor. After all, they were not allowed to join guilds, and as such had more limited career choices [banking, law practice, etc.]. Any resulting genetic preference would have been coincidental.

I also theorize that because Jews were so often victimized [Inquisition and the like], they were forced to strategize in order to ensure survival. This would have created another need for higher intelligence. It is also possible that it is the other way around, and Jews survived so many onslaughts by being naturally better at it, but this is just one possibility.

It is also possible that the dumb ones were killed off during the aforementioned attacks.