[Pharmboy]

WOW...The NY Times comes as close as possible to publishing a piece that supports genes as a determinant of intellectual ability and achievement. While they do not actually use the terms "innate" or "genetic" in the piece, the authors clearly point to this. This is revolutionary for the Times.

And yes, NY Times, as the authors state, sometimes the story science tells is not what we want to hear. Get used to it.

[Pharmboy]

I can't wait to see the letters the Times gets on THIS one...and BTW, has hell frozen over?

Read the whole piece if you can...a way to get around registering is do Google news search with the headline key words and click through from there.

[jocon307]

Only to the left is this news. But, I have to say, no matter how high your IQ is if you make no effort and just sit on your tushy you probably won’t achieve much.

But, you’ll still be smart.

[proxy_user]

The article mixes up two types of skills.

For athletes and musicians, it is highly probably that he who practices the most will perform the best.

On the other hand, in the case of people like creative mathematicians and artists, repetitive practice would probably hold them back.

For 99.9% of all jobs and professions, it is practice and experience that will be most useful. You have to have a basic level of intelligence to be a doctor or an accountant, but after that it’s just experience and application.

[ken21]

bump.

[OldCountryBoy]

On the heals of this recent post.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2810113/posts

I work with a team of PhD’s that can’t find the door unless someone else is leading. Heaven forbid it another PhD. The “best” (high-school drop-outs through PhDs) are the folks with real life experience backing them up.

I also find folks with hobbies (RC planes/cars, gardening, wood-working, flying, racing...) are much more rounded, and grounded.

[DuncanWaring]

Nor is it to say that it’s impossible for a person with an average I.Q. to, say, earn a Ph.D. in physics.

Yeah it is.

A person with an average I.Q. can't even master the vocabulary of physics.

[exDemMom]

I scored 98%ile in math, and 99%ile in English on the SAT, many eons ago (before it was dumbed down, anyway). And I did go on to get a doctorate.

Still, I have to wonder what, really, IQ does mean. I think it is only a measure of a certain kind of intelligence.

My niece asked me last summer about the nature of intelligence. I told her that there are many kinds of intelligence—for instance, while I have a very good understanding of science, I have no sports ability whatsoever. I can’t sing, and my artistic ability is about the same as it was when I was ten. But I saw a TV show about a little girl who, at the age of about 6, was selling her paintings professionally, and seems to have an understanding of artistic arrangement that rivals that of people who have been studying art for years. Then there was Tiger Woods—a golf genius from the time he was old enough to pick up a golf club, although clearly not so bright in other areas.

Maybe there should be other intelligence measures, that take into account abilities not falling into the traditional academic categories.

Success, I believe, is largely a matter of finding out where one’s interests and abilities are, and practicing one’s strengths.

[Lady Lucky]

Talent is like a three-legged stool. Yes, it will give you a boost. But mind your balance and don’t get overconfident.

[freespirited]

Nor is it to say that it’s impossible for a person with an average I.Q. to, say, earn a Ph.D. in physics.

I'd like the authors to back up this statement by producing a few PhD physicists of average intelligence. I sure as hell have never met one.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

those who were in the 99.9 percentile — the profoundly gifted — were between three and five times more likely to go on to earn a doctorate,

So? Ph.D. Piled high and Deep.

Have known a bunch of them, they tend not to actually DO anything.

But I am sure in the world of the NYT a PhD is the highest level of achievement and means that you can tell the peons what to do.

In real life the peons will laugh at you because you can't actually DO anything.

[Silentgypsy]

Ping

[Poser]

So intelligence and hard work are more likely to be successful than hard work and lack of intelligence.

Who would have thunk it?

[GOP Poet]

Needless to say the OWSers were the bottom of the barrel in positive genetic intelligence factors. They do however continue to practice their idiocy over and over again.

[aMorePerfectUnion]

“Everybody is a genius.
But if you judge a fish by its ability to
climb a tree, it will live its whole life
believing that it is stupid.”

-Albert Einstein

[1010RD]

So the Bell Curve is real?

Their contention that PhD = success is nonsense and detracts from the story.

[Charles H. (The_r0nin)]

From the full article: "...those who were in the 99.9 percentile — the profoundly gifted — were between three and five times more likely to go on to earn a doctorate, secure a patent, publish an article in a scientific journal or publish a literary work. A high level of intellectual ability gives you an enormous real-world advantage. "

Bull****! Notice that the only "advantages" they list are all verbal/intellectual. How about income? How about market-share? How about job satisfaction? How about actual production (as opposed to "visualization")?

The world needs less doctorates (especially in hypen-studies) and more do-ers!