Posted on 08/25/2005 7:36:48 PM PDT by Aussie Dasher
HALF the population will dismiss this story - but a new study claims the cleverest people are far more likely to be male than female.
Men are more intelligent than women by about five IQ points on average, making them better suited for tasks of high complexity, according to the authors of a paper due to be published in the British Journal of Psychology.
Genetic differences in intelligence between the sexes helped explain why many more men than women won Nobel Prizes or became chess grandmasters, the study by Paul Irwing and Richard Lynn concludes.
They showed that men outnumbered women in increasing numbers as intelligence levels rose. There were twice as many with IQ scores of 125, typical for people with first-class degrees.
When scores rose to 155, associated with genius, there were 5.5 men for every woman.
Dr Irwing, a senior lecturer in organisational psychology at Manchester University, said he was uncomfortable with the findings. However, he said, the evidence was clear, despite the insistence of many academics that there were no meaningful gender differences in levels of intelligence.
"For personal reasons I would like to believe men and women are equal, and broadly that's true," he said. "But over a period of time the evidence in favour of biological factors has become stronger and stronger.
"I have been dragged in a direction that I don't particularly like, but it would be sensible if the debate was based on what we pretty much know to be the case."
The findings come from a study of 24,000 British students, and will intensify a battle of the sexes that was triggered last week by a BBC newscaster, Michael Buerk, who complained that life was now being lived according to women's rules.
Buerk said men had been reduced to little more than sperm donors because of the female dominance of society.
Professor Lynn, emeritus professor of psychology at the University of Ulster, is no stranger to inflammatory conclusions as the author of several publications arguing there are differences in intelligence between racial groups.
He published a study in 2003 that identified a clear correlation between the levels of prosperity in 60 countries and the average IQ of their populations.
Professor Lynn argued in a letter to The Psychologist this month that differences between the sexes were explained by a link between IQ and brain size.
"Men have larger brains than women by about 10 per cent and larger brains confer greater brain power," he said.
"So men must necessarily be on average more intelligent than women."
Hey! Y'hear that, honey? They say that—
*cast-iron frying pan comes flying out of nowhere*
((((BONNNNNG)))
i tHiNk a nAp w1Ll d0 mE a w0rLd oF gOod n0w. *THUNK*
I agree!
I don't need any help in making myslef look like an idiot.
I'm more than capable of doing that all on my own.
Men may have larger brains, but it depends on what we use that excess capacity for; most likely visual-spatial analysis. For a simple example, a dog's brain is smaller than a human's, but large percentage of the dog's brain is dedicated to smell. Thus, an animal with a smaller brain can detect and discriminate scent molecules a human couldn't hope to discern.
OF COURSE you are smarter honey. I just didn't know that swiping that liddle widdle bit of plastic so many times would run up such a biggie wiggie bill. Can you fix it, teddy bear?
Men have two brains, the big one and the little one. Its a fact that most men do most of their thinking with the little brain. That is why women have the upper hand most of the time.
MAN SMART, WOMAN SMARTER (Kuhn)
Let us put man and woman together
See which one is smarter
Some say men, but I say no
Women got the men like a puppet show
Chorus:
It ain't me, it's the people that say
The men are leading the women astray
But I say, it's the women today
They're smarter than the men in every way
That's right, the women are smarter
That's right, the women are smarter
A little boy sat down and cried
A old man passed and asked him why
He said "I can't do what the big boys do"
The old man sat down and he cried too
(Repeat chorus)
It takes more intelligence to be a hunter of wild game than a gatherer of berries.
Men of genius often have a single-minded commitment to their vocations, visions and ideas, and the willingness to defend them against all critics and attackers.
Women, on the other hand, tend to prefer maintaining and nurturing relationships, and favour discussing and soothing feeling instead of the cut and thrust of vigorous debate.
This isn't to say that there are no women who have the hallmarks of genius, just that there are far fewer of them than men.
I coulda told the ex, but I already knew she wouldn't believe it, and it would be a wasted, frustrating effort on my part.
Yeah...I know...bloody phone call right in the middle of posting...
Actually, the big brain comes with an easy-to-access off-switch.
Isn't this just half of the old "More geniuses, more idiots" among men hypothethis?
If men are smarter than women, why do women possess most of the wealth?
Answer: DIVORCE!!!
LIES!!! That's what the cats want you to think!
I have said too much...
The truth is that intelligence comes in different flavors. Men are better at things that require concentration on a single task but a women will do better at multitasking. When you want to find something in the house do you ask the man or the woman? When you what the car fixed who do you ask?
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