Quote from: flasyb on February 17, 2012, 08:33:14 AM^^Nah, I remember reading Simon Baron Cohen's book, Zero Degrees of Empathy, and he reckons that research shows the more intelligent/educated you are, the more empathy you are likely to have. It's empathy that drives a lot of the left's notions of social security or welfare systems and a lack of empathy that drives the more conservative notion of fending for yourself or standing on your own two feet. From the DM:QuoteIn adulthood, the children were asked whether they agreed with statements such as, 'I wouldn't mind working with people from other races,' and 'I wouldn't mind if a family of a different race moved next door.'They were also asked whether they agreed with statements about typically right-wing and socially conservative politics such as, 'Give law breakers stiffer sentences,' and 'Schools should teach children to obey authority.'The researchers also compared their results against a 1986 American study which included tests of cognitive ability and questions assessing prejudice against homosexuals.So they were asked questions that are typically associated with right wing belief structures and these were compared with their answers to questions about race and suchlike. Simple really.Well, let's find that study I talked about, then. ;)Empathy isn't cleanly correlated to IQ. Cohen is tripping. Seriously. In fact, I would guess that once your IQ gets to 140 and above then you'd be considerably less empathic. High-IQ people (140+) tend to be socially-awkward, don't have a huge amount of relationships, things required for developing empathy, amigo.Why did the "dumber" kids say "give law breakers stiffer sentences"? All I see is "dumber" kids repeating the "status quo" (which happens to be conservative) which they know to be safe. If "liberalism" was the "status quo" I'm sure the dumber kids would also repeat liberal lines. In fact, just take a look at some OWS ppl who clearly don't have an IQ above 105 and listen to the way they repeat things which are considered the "status quo" within their own organic/anarchist communities. I've spent time in liberal/anarchist communities and have seen plenty of folks blindly repeat "liberal status quo" stuff -- and usually they weren't that intelligent.To say there is a direct correlation between IQ and Empathy is really pushing it. There are plenty of smart people who comment on this forum and just by the nature of their comments, it's clear to me that they are NOT empathic. Cohen's study is bunch of bunk, imho.
^^Nah, I remember reading Simon Baron Cohen's book, Zero Degrees of Empathy, and he reckons that research shows the more intelligent/educated you are, the more empathy you are likely to have. It's empathy that drives a lot of the left's notions of social security or welfare systems and a lack of empathy that drives the more conservative notion of fending for yourself or standing on your own two feet. From the DM:QuoteIn adulthood, the children were asked whether they agreed with statements such as, 'I wouldn't mind working with people from other races,' and 'I wouldn't mind if a family of a different race moved next door.'They were also asked whether they agreed with statements about typically right-wing and socially conservative politics such as, 'Give law breakers stiffer sentences,' and 'Schools should teach children to obey authority.'The researchers also compared their results against a 1986 American study which included tests of cognitive ability and questions assessing prejudice against homosexuals.So they were asked questions that are typically associated with right wing belief structures and these were compared with their answers to questions about race and suchlike. Simple really.
In adulthood, the children were asked whether they agreed with statements such as, 'I wouldn't mind working with people from other races,' and 'I wouldn't mind if a family of a different race moved next door.'They were also asked whether they agreed with statements about typically right-wing and socially conservative politics such as, 'Give law breakers stiffer sentences,' and 'Schools should teach children to obey authority.'The researchers also compared their results against a 1986 American study which included tests of cognitive ability and questions assessing prejudice against homosexuals.
^^True, I'm definitely talking about a broader definition of intelligence and Cohen put a lot of emphasis on education too.
I'm not sure why you think that intelligent people struggle to form relationships. People with a high IQ don't lack social intelligence as far as I'm aware. If anything, they more likely to be smart enough not to say stupid things that might lead to the being socially ostracised. I suppose there is an image of the intellectual loner but I seriously doubt that having a high IQ is such a social handicap as you suggest. I would have thought that a low IQ (or low intelligence) would leave a person less able to articulate themselves, how they feel and their wants/needs (making them less functional socially). The opposite would be true for people with a high IQ (or high intelligence) who at the same time are more able to see things from multiple perspectives and thus empathise.
Like you, I'm not sure I buy any correlation, negative or positive, between IQ and empathy. I know some smart people who have a lot of empathy and I know some fairly average (IQ-wise) people who have a lot of empathy. I've seen the reverse (people with no empathy) for both IQ ranges, too. Likewise, I'm not sure I see a connection between relationships and empathy. I've known too many people who have functioning relationships (I wouldn't say happy, but that's just because of my definition of happy) where one or both people had very little empathy but happened to be compatible anyway. I've also known a few people for whom their empathy was actually a fairly serious impediment to having a successful relationship. I suspect this happens more than most of us think.I would buy a connection between empathy and imagination, but I don't think we have a way to quantify or measure imagination, so that doesn't really help either.
Also, I'm not sure you're using status quo correctly in this context. What you're talking about seems more like "echo chamber" or groupthink, which is a whole other phenomenon. You were right about the status quo being conservative though. It's part of the original definition of conservative. That's because conservatism is, at it's core, "status quo". It's in the name. What are we "conserving"? The status quo. It's the idea that things are fine, have pretty much always been fine for as long as the current society/system has existed and we shouldn't rock the boat. Liberalism by contrast is at it's core all about changing or challenging the status quo. It's the idea that things aren't "just fine", or that "just fine" isn't good enough, that we need to be constantly better than we were yesterday. It's about trying to make the world a better place through change, usually via government because these are usually political movements. It thus, cannot really be the status quo, but is in fact about working towards the absence of a status quo. It's constant change (hopefully good, but who knows because it's not as if we had time to test it out).The fact that some countries (not naming names here) now believe that liberal and conservative instead mean a whole specific set of occasionally random yet unchangeable opinions on issues that affect their country today and didn't even exist say 150 years ago doesn't change the meaning or underlying core of each word/movement.Also, if both these views seem at their core to be pretty retarded and a recipe for a terrible society should any one actually win, then congratulations, you now know more about politics than your average voter in a democracy.
All of this talk got me thinking about my beloved Myers-Briggs theory. Here's some food for controversial thought. ***DISCLAIMER*** I have not read everything I'm linking to nor am I condoning, promoting or condemning anything contained therein. I just find it may be relevant fuel for the discussion. http://www.personalitypathways.com/article/emotional-intelligence.html A controversial blog post supporting the idea that NT combinations have higher IQs and that Right-wingers are actually more intelligent and happier than Left-wingers. Date: 2004http://www.personalitypathways.com/article/emotional-intelligence.html Discussion on EQ's growing importance against IQ and if the MBTI definition of Thinking is really unrelated to the definition of FeelingShttp://www.wpi.edu/Pubs/E-project/Available/E-project-021508-211201/unrestricted/IQP_JMW.pdf Study from WPI (Worcester Polytech Institute) examining literature regarding the relationship of Intelligence and Personality Typehttp://research.similarminds.com/intelligence-test-performance-and-myers-briggs-type/28 Chart comparing MBTI types with results of a Visual Intelligence Test. Cursory glance gives no legit source for study.
A controversial blog post supporting the idea that NT combinations have higher IQs and that Right-wingers are actually more intelligent and happier than Left-wingers. Date: 2004
No, my friend.Genius IQ's are associated with being somewhat of a loner for good reasons. You can't relate well to other people b/c they're on a different plain than you. For them, talking to another "human" often will probably feel like us talking to a monkey. There's gotta be a study on how high IQ (140+) people struggle with having a large social network (or any social network). Seems like common sense. IQ is beneficial for social relationships up to a certain point but after genius level, it all goes down hill. Look it up, bro.Low IQ folks can just flow with the group, go with the status quo. Join the baseball team. Allow the society you're surrounded by to do the thinking for you and just repeat the lines they give you. Being less-self aware they don't have to worry about how they're perceived as much. They can have a nice, broad base of relationships.
Quote from: peasgoodnonsuch on February 17, 2012, 09:37:16 AMA controversial blog post supporting the idea that NT combinations have higher IQs and that Right-wingers are actually more intelligent and happier than Left-wingers. Date: 2004I'm having a really hard time finding where the articles you've posted say this, or even really understanding the point you're making... but maybe I'm just too lazy to read it and want some hardworking conservative taxpayer to do all the work of explaining it to me.
I see no reason why someone with a high IQ would have less empathy that someone with a low IQ.
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