If you're so smart, why ain't you intelligent?

Earlier this week, I observed an e-free-for-all on the New York Times (NewYorkTimes.com) web site regarding race, intelligence and conservatism versus liberalism. Many readers were incensed by an article, “Social Scientist Sees Bias Within,” and the subsequent comments by other readers. It was quite the feeding frenzy. Unfortunately, even though I read the article before 8 AM, I was too late to join in, as the comments, having already reached the 500 mark, were closed. I joined the also-rans, sending an e-mail to the hard copy Times, which may or may not be printed. I did not join the general debate, but instead criticized the methodology of the research, mostly anecdotal, cited in the article.

But I do want to talk about intelligence here.

As you may be aware, intelligence testing has gathered itself some controversy in recent decades, with special concerns over how disparate scores often are when looked at in terms of race. Some social scientists have been caught up in this controversy as a result of their research, being demonized for the results that they compiled.

Apologists have suggested that there are different types of intelligence, by way of explaining some of the racial divides. This has caused other controversies in kind.

Personally, I think the problem is the supposed concept of "intelligence."

Intelligence is an arbitrary value. In other words, we—or some of us, somewhere, sometime—made it up. We decided what was intelligent and what was not. And whoever it was that decided those things had very specific reasons of their own for making those decisions. He or she was not handed the first IQ test on a mountain top from a burning bush. No, those people simply decided what they, and we, were going to call intelligence.

Here’s what I think: forget intelligence. I think the important factor is cognition. Cognition, the ability to receive, process and apply information, including such functions as awareness, perception, reasoning, and judgment.

And people receive, process and apply information in quite a variety of ways. I’ll give you two personal examples.

I hate reading directions and instructions. My normal approach to any new task is to take a quick glance at the directions, give them a exasperated “Huh?” and then proceed to attempt the task until I run into trouble. At that point I can look at that part of the instructions and have a much clearer understanding of what the heck they’re talking about. But I know many people who can sit down and read the instruction manual and then get right down to it. I’m more of a “Help screen” type of guy. Other folks much prefer to see a diagram than written instructions. Still others do better when they see a demonstration.

I think that these are different ways of receiving and processing information. Different ways because our brains are different, though still roughly categorized because our sensory receptors are of finite variety.

Another example: My daughter can think in math—almost like it’s another language. Me, I always got good grades in math, but it was always a chore. My daughter enjoys math. Go figure. She was even considering getting a teaching degree so she could teach math, but then decided on a music major instead. Well, guess what. Turns out math and music are just two facets of the same general concept. Hey, don’t ask me to explain it; I just read it somewhere. Not surprisingly, the music my daughter likes to play on her tenor saxophone is a very technical style of jazz, unlike any that I was familiar with prior to attending her recitals. She says it is very math based. That didn’t surprise me in the least. My type of jazz is Chuck Mangione; she, however, tends not to share my enthusiam.

So my daughter and I, while both successful in school, still have some very different ways of slicing and dicing the world around us. If we were to go head-to-head in a math challenge, she’d wipe the floor with me. In social sciences, I think I might have the upper hand. Our brains are just different enough that we end up with different strengths.

But here’s the thing: she chose to become a music professional, while I spent my career mostly in various types of social, health and service industries. In other words, we did what we were good at. We found comfort zones, and success, in pursuits that took best advantage of how our brains processed information. One wasn’t better than the other, simply different.

I think that’s a key to understanding cognition as opposed to intelligence. There may be some racial differences, but I would suggest that they are differences in cognition. Further, I would suggest that these differences may have evolved, to a large degree, based on the specific demands of living in various environments or have been self-selecting due to preferences of associating with, literally, like-minded folks. This is a somewhat simplistic explanation for the actual evolutionary processes involved, but I hope you catch my drift.

Intelligence is arbitrary. Cognition is intrinsic.

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To put a name to it

I need a systemic nomenclature, dedicated terms to help clarify my thinking, especially as it relates to the thought processes described in my last two posts.

We'll start with the basics: names for the two opposed positions on my recent subject continuum.

I have researched some standard terms: liberal, conservative, progressive, reactionary, socialist, fascist and several more in the same vein. Turns out that various socio-political philosophies have mixed and matched these terms for the past few centuries; pinning down a consistent meaning is a task that seems beyond me, anyway.

I decided to go with a couple of other terms. Though they, too, have been used in socio-political contexts, it has not been extensively so in recent decades. These terms have the additional advantage of speaking directly to the continuum of emotional response to which I have alluded over the past two weeks, that of the degree of comfort with or acceptance of change and uncertainty.

The terms I have determined to use are these: reform and resistance. I’ll define these terms here, as I intend to use them. I will also open a new page, “Glossary,” linked on the right under the Pages heading.

Reform: a preference for change in policies and practices that will, from this perspective, be the approach more likely to improve socio-economic conditions.

Resistance: a preference for the status quo or for a re-establishment of ultimately traditional former policies and practices that, from this perspective, are more likely to improve socio-economic conditions.

Let’s call those definitions works-in-progress. I suspect already that they will need further development and clarification. I will update the definitions on the Glossary page and will probably preserve the revisions there for editorial reference.

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Getting to the point—finally

It is one week later—in a process that has gone on for several years—and I am, not surprisingly, no closer to a solution to the problem I began to describe last week.

I will approach this from the ground up.

Over the last several months I have put forth my arguments and position that behavior is emotion-caused and that emotions are the result of biological processes generally beyond immediate conscious influence. Moreover, I have maintained that emotions trump logic in any significant behavioral choice, even that of supposedly going against one’s feelings.

Let me reiterate, for the record, that this does not mean that I believe individuals are not responsible for their own behavior, only that our confusion over this matter leads everyone to make some very ineffective decisions both in action and in reaction.

To return to my premise: last week I began a discussion of two virtually universal emotional states popularly referred to as liberal and conservative. I suggested that these temperaments probably occurred throughout the population in a continuum of intensity that saw most people clustered toward the center and very few people occupying the extreme manifestations of these outlooks. I explained that distribution of intensity in the population as approximating the classic bell-shaped curve of common statistical analysis and I explained what that meant. I offered no evidence to support my claim but I argue that, given the size of the population being considered, which is everybody, that bell curve of distribution is pretty much guaranteed.

So far, so good.

Now I will appear to digress; don’t be fooled.

Many years ago I had a wise man tell me, “The more insecurity someone can live with, the happier he will be.” He had noted that life was fraught with uncertainty and that this could cast a pall of threat over one’s existence. His suggestion was that, if this uncertainty—which, in any case, could not be avoided—could be accepted and embraced, then one could attend better to the joys that are also presented in life and live more effectively at the same time.

Here, then, is what I consider the crux of this matter and one which I have long hoped to couch in purely neutral terms. But that is what I have been unable to do. So I’ll just go with what I have.

It is my belief that so-called liberals and conservatives find themselves on opposite sides of this acceptance divide. Liberals, generally, are able to accept more uncertainty, while conservatives, comparatively speaking, are more attuned to threat.

. . . ?!

Hmmm-mm. Actually, that came out a lot more neutral-sounding than I expected. I’m a bit flummoxed. I was prepared to provide lengthy qualifying explanations, but maybe not.

More on the ramifications of this at a later date. For right now, I’m going to quit while I think I’m ahead.

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Throw you a curve

First off, I’ll mention my hew blog, Uncle Genie’s Deep Space. It provides an outlet for some of my speculative concerns about the physical world and how it operates. My interests spring from many years of personal conjecture about the nature of time. Eventually, this drew me to a glancing acquaintance with topics in metaphysics, astrophysics and cosmology, quantum physics and related topics in earth sciences and other subjects. Not to suggest that I have any substantial knowledge or even understanding in those areas, but it is interesting and I enjoy the occasional foray into thematic waters that are way over my head. Feel free to join me in a little mind-bending exercise. There’s a link on the right.

As to my topic on this blog today, well, it’s still in a formative state, like a gelatin mold that’s only been in the ‘fridge for a short time—getting thick, but still kind of loose and fluid. Problem is, it’s been like that for a few years now. So let me lay out the basics.

It seems to me that the general temperaments commonly referred to as conservative and liberal represent personal psychological traits that give rise to our world views. Furthermore, I suggest that these two orientations are, more or less, universal human attributes, though the degree of intensity of those feelings falls on a continuum between the two extremes, most likely in a classic bell-shaped curve.

I reckon I might explain the bell curve.

The bell curve, a shape that shows what "average" looks like.

The bell curve is a graphic (think “picture”) method of showing a normal distribution (“average”) of scores (in this case, think “people’s attitudes”).

For example, let’s suppose all of us took a survey of questions to find out whether we had conservative or liberal opinions. If each of our surveys were converted to a numbered tally to score our outlook, then it is most likely that the majority of us would find ourselves in the groups whose survey tallies place us in the large number of scores just left or right of the center. In other words, we might be conservative or liberal, but not extremely so and generally tending toward a centrist viewpoint while maintaining our liberal or conservative attitude. That is the 34% percent on either side of the center line.

The more extreme the survey tally, the further out from the center would be the score, representing smaller and smaller numbers of people, until the most extreme viewpoints represent only about 2% of each side. The last percent or two (not shown on this curve, but way out there on the flat ends) are the real nut cases.

So basically, if we were all piled up on top one another in stacks that were based on each possible survey score, and somebody stood way, way off and looked at the pile, that bell-shaped curve would most likely be the outline of the stacks.

Stack us up according to our scores and stand way off....

If you don’t understand, then just see me after class.

I don’t mean to suggest that everyone is locked into an attitude that applies to everything or all the time. Just that we have a significant tendency to maintain consistent positions on most issues most of the time.

The big question about this whole matter, though, is why?

I have some notions; unfortunately, this is the messy part. And since I’ve gone into some mind-numbing detail on some boring topics here today, I think I’ll table the issue for now, probably pick it up again next week.

And give me just a few more days to think about it.

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A rose by any other name

Here’s the essential problem with taxes as I see it: it’s the word “tax.” It just sounds bad. Its pronunciation has a harsh quality, even a threatening tone. Tax is just an unpleasant-sounding word.

In addition, “tax” carries an ancient connotation of coercion and disregard for one’s circumstances, a carryover from the days of free-spending monarchies, overarching empires and the practices of feudalism. Taxes then were collected by force without regard to the destitution of the populous.

Which is hardly the standard today; quite the opposite. Taxes lay lightest on the poorest.

Nor is anyone forced to pay taxes in this American age. In the days of feudalism, the peasants were tied to the land and really had no choice. Today, however, if you don’t want to pay taxes, you don’t have to; you can simply leave the country. Many corporations do it. Just so they won’t have to pay taxes. I wish more people would, too—specifically those always complaining about taxes.

Personally, I’ve always taken the perspective that taxes are more of a membership dues, the fee for allowing me the privileges and benefits of residing in and being a citizen of the United States of America. And that is no small thing. Consider just the guarantees of the Bill of Rights, let alone property ownership protection, the national parks, the interstate highway system and the Department of Defense, among a long, long list of additional and significant benefits.

The United States is a remarkable place, as many of us do notice. And for what we get, I think it’s a bargain. Especially compared to the price that many of our armed forces personnel have paid and are continuing to pay on this very day.

If you are a Citizen, then show some backbone. Quit your incessant whining. Pay your dues. Sure, things aren’t perfect. The whole operation is run by humans; what did you expect? Could it be better? Of course. We keep working on it. But quit thinking of taxes as a penalty.

Perhaps everyone needs to be reminded of exactly what it is we’re paying for: the United States of America. “The greatest country in the world” as many would have it. Well, look at it this way: you get what you pay for.

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