Why the sudden need to create and attack strawman ? [LWN.net]

Why the sudden need to create and attack strawman ?

Posted Sep 29, 2007 7:30 UTC (Sat) by khim (subscriber, #9252)
In reply to: To Sir, with Love: How To Get More Women Involved in Open Source (O'ReillyNet) by AJWM
Parent article: To Sir, with Love: How To Get More Women Involved in Open Source (O'ReillyNet)

While it's certainly true that "it's not just a matter of how big it is but how well you use it" (some geniuses had tiny brain and some idiots had huge one) the fact still remains: sheer size of brain is a statistically reliable factor - at least among representatives of the same species. Why all these derogatory comments all of sudden ?

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Because it is false

Posted Sep 29, 2007 22:24 UTC (Sat) by man_ls (guest, #15091) [Link] (2 responses)

Well, because it is not true at all. Big people have bigger brains; small people have comparatively bigger brains as related to body mass. Fat people have worse ratios. You can account for those differences as in the encephalization quotient, and it works fairly well for big differences between species. But within a species you are lost: there are so many ways to account for the differences that once you are finished your bias is more likely to show up than any meaningful statistics. Across genders things are only worse.

It is bad enough to relate engineering capability to brain size of any kind, but to compare genders is utter nonsense. It is really surprising that it should show up here. Next we will be comparing penises in the showers to decide who is the boss.

False ? Are you sure ?

Posted Sep 29, 2007 23:22 UTC (Sat) by khim (subscriber, #9252) [Link] (1 responses)

You've pointed above to this article. If you'll bother to read it to the "see also" list you'll find this link where you can read that "modern studies using MRI have shown that brain size shows substantial and consistent correlation ( r = .35 to .43 in various studies) with IQ among adults of the same sex" - with pointers to said studies. As for adults of different sexes - it's much harder to measure without bias, but it's not clear why there should not be a difference...

Of course "there's a lot inside a skull other than just the brain" and social factors are 100 times more effective segregation factor then small inborn difference in intelligence...

Pretty much

Posted Sep 30, 2007 8:49 UTC (Sun) by man_ls (guest, #15091) [Link]

True, there is a controversy, and while some studies find a weak correlation, others don't. However, as you say, across genders the correlation is not measurable. Among other things because IQ is calibrated exactly so that males and females have the same mean score, 100. Therefore, any correlation that involves gender and IQ score is biased to start with.