Free Republic

In 1958, an English sociologist and Labour politician named Michael Young imagined a future in which the British establishment dissolved itself, abolished all forms of hereditary power, and created instead a meritocracy (a word Young invented) based on IQ. In Young's fable, the academically talented working class happily join the elite. But the less talented resent them even more than they did the old dukes and duchesses. By 2034, this resentment leads to the creation of a violent populist revolution, which sweeps the meritocracy away.To some, this story has always seemed like a warning to the United States. In 1972,...

WASHINGTON, - The high-IQ society known as Mensa has reached its 50th birthday but says it is renewing itself in the United States with a new cohort of younger members. The group says 42 percent of its new members in 2009-10 were ages 29 to 49 and during the past 10 years the number of members under 30 has grown by 63 percent, USA Today reported Monday. American Mensa National Chairwoman Elissa Rudolph told the newspaper the group is aiming to get "more people involved and younger people more involved." Part of the effort is Saturday's National Mensa Testing Day,...