OK, before you jump down my throat for being a sexist pig, I am not. I am simply relaying some facts about the Australian education system to check its validity.
According to the Victorian Board of Studies, ever since the system started up (almost 100 years ago), if you took the top 50 performers from year 12 (senior high school year) from every year, the majority would be male on every occasion. It also goes on to say that as a whole, however, girls perform better then guys do.
Does this mean, that, on a global scale, the smartest people in the world are men, but, as a whole, women are smarter?
I bet if you took the average of ALL the women and compare it to ALL the men, the women’s average would be higher. This is basically what you said, the smartest people are usually men, but overall, women are generally smarter.
A man’s brain weighs more than a woman’s, so a man has the potential to be more intelligent but women do better with what they have so they come out ahead.
And how in the hell is anybody going to validate those facts? What is your measure? Do you want a qualitative or quantative analysis? What is your definition of “smart”? Nobody has ever even agreed on the above fundamentals so I’m not sure why you think that this is going to have a simple answer.
I’m not talking simple IMHO “I think that boys are better than girls” opinion here. I’m talking about the fact that we need to have a discussion before we can even get to the point of giving any kind of acceptable answer. ALL studies are going to be extremely open to interpretation and there will be cites to support both sides. That is a debate.
Look, there are some people who believe the moon landing was faked. Does that mean if I post a question here “Who was the 7th person to land on the moon?”, does that mean you would come running in and say:
“Wait! Wait! Wait! FIRST we have to debate whether or not the moon landings were actually faked, and ALL agree on it. Then we have to decide what we actually mean by LANDING. Does that count if the person who stays in the shuttle, and doesn’t actually step foot on the lunar surface? AFTER we have debated that, you can come back and ask again.”
I am just interested to know if any studies have been done which give some indication that my OP may be true.
Handy, yes, men’s brains are larger. So are men. The ratio of brain-to-body size is the same for men and women. I think Cecil addressed this, but I couldn’t find a column.
Now you’re saying that what you really meant to ask was
This is a completely different question. The first asks for a reader’s interpretation of the facts, the second merely whether any further studies have been done. The first begs a debate, the second a mere cite.
Mannie would have understandably moved the first, prompting you to flame him yet again in the pit. But he would have been right to do so.
Do you see? You need to frame your questions with a touch more care if you want a simple answer.
I think many women consider women to be, on average, smarter than men. Many men consider men to be, on average, smarter than women.
There are also probably a few women who consider men smarter, and men who consider women smarter.
IMHO, many of the girls I know are smarter than the guys I know (at least on the surface), because it’s very “uncool” for a guy to be smart. We get beat up for that sort of thing.
Of course, this all depends on what we mean by “smart”.
I have read several times that the spread among men is larger than among women, and that there are more men at both extremes, i.e. more geniuses and more morons (or whatever the correct term is) are men. I think this is generally accepted as true, even given the vagaries of defining intelligence. I’ve never come across anyone who says it isn’t the case.
christ some people sure are pissy about some pretty benign stuff.
I got the notion of the OP on the first read and I don’t have the luck of being female. I’m just a dumb guy. Of course I don’t get all emotive over what is basically a trivia question (as the true answer would have no real-world result. i.e.:“Trivial”).
I think you can take it one of several ways:
One: yes males have a higher (but seldom reached) potential while females may not have as high a potential but on the average tend to maximize their native abilites wheras the average male is too lazy to do so.
Two: The educational system and testing system on which this study is based is biased and therefore the results are suspect.
Three: Australlia Is an extremely male oriented society. But it also heavily slanted towards physical labour enterprises and therefore women often do mcuh of the houshold arithmatic with buying sundries and paying the bills while “Mach Husband” is off shearing sheep and whatnot. In societies like this men are in contol of 99% percent of the job market both top (executive) and bottom (laborer). Since you need a lot mor labourers than executives you select a few people (men of course because it is a patriarchal society) and pay more attention to them, more time with teacher, etc (there may be young women just as bright in the class, but in your society they are destined to be housewives so why bother with them too much?). The remaining males don’t get too much special attention from teacher because they are probably going to be labourers anyhow so what need have they for high brilliance? So what about the young women? Well they learn basic budgeting and household economics (which is really not as simple a subject as one might think). Enough to make them on the averag brighter than the labor class of males but not so much as the “elite” class of boys (of which there are only a few).
There’s more males recorded at the extremes of intelligence - 99.99 percentile and above. But whether or not females who are capable of scoring at this level are simply not being identified is probably the question.
To get an accurate IQ score over 160 you need to test by the age of 8 - it is to do with the chronological age vs mental age. A 4 year old working at an 8 yo level is easier to identify than a 10 yo working at 20 yo level.
Because more boys present with social difficulties than girls at a young age - boys tend to externalise their problems while girls internalise and dumb down, more boys get identified.
If this were in GD where personally I think it belongs I would provide cites but as it is in GQ. I won’t.
Marilyn Vos Savant says she has the highest recorded IQ. That’s in fact not necessarily true. She says that but there are some people who don’t go around parading the results of their IQ tests and who just quietly get on with life
I’m going to assume that this characterisation of Australia is a joke - well, actually, it is a joke, I’m just not sure if it was intended.
Actually, most of the recent studies by the Victorian Board of Studies (if they’re still called that - I’m a bit out of touch) are concerned with problems that boys are having with study, and how far ahead girls are getting. Boys in general don’t read as much as girls (and I can say from my short time as a student teacher, this is very true), and this is leading to problems in the last years of high school.
Dunno how Cecil rates as he isn’t a real person.
Then what is he, handy? A limpet with a typewriter?
A man’s brain weighs more than a woman’s, so a man has the potential to be more intelligent…
Do you have evidence that brain mass correlates with intellectual potential?
…but women do better with what they have…
Do you have evidence that women as a whole “do better” despite their smaller brain mass?
…so they come out ahead.
Do you have evidence that women do “come out ahead”? And would you mind telling us “ahead” of what, exactly?
Come on handy, this is GQ. We need evidence, statistics, peer-reviewed research, something. No offense, handy, but your off-handed “factual” statements aren’t exactly considered Gospel.
Without even getting into the question of “Can human intelligence be accurately measured.” (I don’t personally believe it can) - Any idea of measuring comparative intelligence by the size, weight, or “curvy-ness” of the brain went out in the late 19th century.
I would reccommend checking out The Mismeasure of Man by Steven Jay Gould.
I would provide cites but as it is in GQ. I won’t.