# Should humans with low IQ be..... **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [February 26, 2016, 3:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204 "2016-02-26T15:25:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![XT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/xt/32/456_2.png) [@XT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/XT)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2016, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/61 "2016-02-26T22:33:12Z")
> [@SmartAlecCat](#): > > If you’ve ever played a role playing game (think of it as a microcosm) you’ll know that trying to maximize one trait often has balances in other traits. A well balanced party will have players with a variety of strengths and weaknesses – same with society. > > I’d work on education and fighting ignorance rather than trying to eliminate folks without as much of some arbitrary measure of intelligence. Exactly. ---
**Author:** ![watchwolf49](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9c0ed/32.png) [@watchwolf49](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/watchwolf49)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2016, 11:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/62 "2016-02-26T23:53:29Z")
“If I can collect me tolls / I can eat me rolls” — Little John [Buck vs. Bell](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buck_v._Bell) WHAT ?!? Eugenics is _constitutional_ ?!? God, please say it ain’t so … ---
**Author:** ![Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/439d5e/32.png) [@Some\_Call\_Me.Tim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Some_Call_Me.Tim)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 12:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/63 "2016-02-27T00:08:46Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > Do you know who _else_ tried to do something like this? Next he’ll be advocating vegetarianism! ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/64 "2016-02-27T02:13:48Z")
> [@YogSothoth](#): > > I don’t mind low IQ people around. You get some of these low IQ people walking around and suddenly I’m looking a lot better. That’s why I’ll never be for eugenics. I don’t care about the human race in general, I care about me personally. The worse my competition is, the better I’ll look in comparison So how hard to you have to look? POW! BANG! ZOOM! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/65 "2016-02-27T02:52:16Z")
> [@watchwolf49](#): > > Those of below average intelligence have a roll in our society. I’ll leave examples to the readers imagination, but _somebody_ has to do this kind of work … and the dumber the better. You do realize 50% of people have “below average intelligence” right? Seems like an extreme cut off point. ---
**Author:** ![HurricaneDitka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/96bed5/32.png) [@HurricaneDitka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HurricaneDitka)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 3:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/66 "2016-02-27T03:21:29Z")
> [@XT](#): > > A is going to happen anyway, as the worlds population peaks and then starts to drop fairly dramatically IIRC after 2050 or 2075. Wait what? Who decided the world’s population was going to peek between 2050 and 2075? ---
**Author:** ![Horatio\_Hellpop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/e5b9ba/32.png) [@Horatio\_Hellpop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatio_Hellpop)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 3:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/67 "2016-02-27T03:31:55Z")
A couple things to consider: –Intelligence is not, generally speaking, a heritable trait. –There’s surprisingly little consensus as to what IQ tests actually measure, beyond the ability to score on standardized tests. –If we cull out everyone stupider than you, you’ll be the stupidest person around. Conversations will inevitably drift to schemes to cull you from the gene pool. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 3:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/68 "2016-02-27T03:52:48Z")
Another major problem with this is going to be deciding _what_ IQ test to use. You don’t have to go much farther than the infamous “literacy tests” that were used to deny certain people the right to vote. All tests have bias. What are you going to do when someone else pulls out a test that is biased against _you_ and argues that you should be killed or sterilized? ---
**Author:** ![Flyer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/flyer/32/7298_2.png) [@Flyer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Flyer)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 6:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/69 "2016-02-27T06:34:21Z")
> [@HurricaneDitka](#): > > Wait what? Who decided the world’s population was going to peek between 2050 and 2075? Peek out of what? A window or a door? ---
**Author:** ![nicky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/f0a364/32.png) [@nicky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nicky)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/70 "2016-02-27T14:21:41Z")
If you are worried about overpopulation, the correct solution is: Female Literacy. ---
**Author:** ![StarvingButStrong](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/starvingbutstrong/32/335_2.png) [@StarvingButStrong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/StarvingButStrong)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 3:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/71 "2016-02-27T15:24:37Z")
So true. You open up the door to more opportunities for women, and they choose to have fewer children. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 8:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/72 "2016-02-27T20:24:07Z")
When I took a psychology course at El Camino College, in Torrance, California, in Fall 1970, we used a 1974 edition of a textbook written mostly by a psychologist named George W. Crane, who had a Ph. D. and an M. D., and two others, apparently his sons, who had doctor degrees of their own. Here is a commentary from his book on this thread’s issue: **The Social Frankenstein Producing the Socialism Trend.** In our civilized nations we are now witnessing a reversal of the age-old rule about the survival of the fit. Instead, the unfit are beginning to overpopulate us. A century ago _[Crane meant this to be about 1850],_ the good stock produced large families, as the feeble-minded still do. Suppose your great-great-grandfather had eight children, like the feeble-minded Kallikak family in the same neighborhood. Bothe families may have suffered typhoid and diphtheria, scarlet fever and the other children’s diseases. But because the intelligent family was a bit more provident and better fed, let’s assume that only three of its eight children died before adulthood, while four of the Kallikaks succumbed. In this situation, your great-great-grandfather thus saw five of his offspring mature against four for the Kallikaks. The survival of the fit was still in evidence. But limitation of the size of the families has become more apparent in the civilized nations nowadays, especially among the better-educated and more intelligent stock. This has reached such an extreme state that our college population today often doesn’t even reproduce itself, although the sub normal continue to breed like guinea pigs. Because we now vaccinate and inoculate the feeble-minded children, furnish them free food and shelter as relief wards of the state, and even screen them out by psychological tests so they can’t go to war, they actually lead a coddled, sheltered existence unheard of in all previous history. They can’t die from epidemics or starvation or battle injuries! So the subnormals are becoming a unique social Frankenstein, supported by the normal stock whose taxes keep increasing meanwhile until the size of the normal family is further reduced. Politically, too, this is becoming a grave condition, for the subnormals can vote, even if they can only make an “X” on a ballot and are unable to sign their own names. Suppose we start out with two American couples and carry them through 100 years. One is of sound intelligent stock whom we’ll call “Normal.” The other is “Subnormnal.” We’ll allow a breeding cycle of 25 years, although the feeble-minded actually start mating in the teens, with or without benefit of marriage. Even incest is no great deterrent to them. Our juvenile homes are full of such pregnant girls, many of whom are bearing offspring to their own brothers or fathers. We’ll be ultraconsetrvative, too, and limit the family of the “Subnormal” to four children. The “Normal” will have two children per generation. Assume, too, that all offspring live to adulthood and reproduce their own kind. Now examine the data and see how the “Subnormal” offspring will be outvoting your “Normal” stock. The two couple marry in 1975\* [dates changed to accommodate this edition]\* when they offset each other’s votes in a ratio of 1:1. 1975: Subnormal couple 2; Normal couple 2; Voting ratio 1:1. 2000: Subnormal couple 4; Normal couple 2; Voting ratio 2:1. 2025: Subnormal couple 16; Normal couple 4; Voting ratio 4:1. 2050: Subnormal couple 64; Normal couple 8; Voting ratio 8:1. 2075: Subnormal couple 256; Normal couple 16; Voting ratio 16:1. In one generation of 25 years, therefore, the children of the 3,500,000 college students of the U.S.A. are snowed under at the polls in a 2:1 ratio by the offspring of an equal group of 3,500,000 abnormals who have far outbred them! No wonder demagogues can win elections with beautiful promises of giving impossible pensions and more free medicine, or even a free automobile to every poor couple! The subnormals forget readily, so even if these pre-election promises are not fully kept, their votes can be won the next time simply by varying the nature of the promised rewards. Subnormals naturally want something for nothing. They will even sell out the future heritage of their children, even as the Indians traded Manhattan for a few dime-store beads (anachronism) and some firewater. For even the top level of the feeble-minded (moron group) has only eleven-year-old mental ability. It lives for today and seldom thinks ahead of the next meal. When Benjamin Franklin was eagerly asked what kind of government we were to have, he replied, “You have a republic, if you can keep it.” He recognized the precarious nature of this remarkable political system, for he understood how easily mobs can be seduced against their own ultimate good. Hitler and Mussolini and other European dictators subconsciously sensed this same dangerous trend and resorted to fascism to control the masses without letting them have a free vote. In [the Soviet Union], the Communist party is also really an oligarchy for it restricts voting to its few million members out of the total population of approximately 250,000,000 [Soviet citizens]. The Roman Republic rotted internally because of the degeneration of intelligence and morality, for the populace began to sell its votes for wheat and thus lazily waited for the highest bidder. Politicians have lately begun to express bewilderment at their inability to predict the outcome of elections. They need to recognize the Frankenstein that has doubled in size in the last [few generations]. The churches, too, must realize that ethics depend on high intelligence, as to trigonometry and other refined cerebral functions, so the zooming percentages of subnormals will be a serious religious threat. For stupid mobs not only can be incited to lynch a man, but they can also be agitated against the churches and especially the tax-free nature of church property. Everybody is thus in danger when demagogues can appeal to subnormals to win elections. Socialism came as a surprise to Britain, too, for the rapidly mountain subnormal voting population can turn on any benevolent economic system that has nurtured it, and then actually destroy its benefactor as Frankenstein killed his highly intelligent creator. From _Psychology Applied,_ by George W. Crane, Ph. D., M.D.; Daniel B. Crane, D.D.S.; David G. Crane, J. D., M. D. This edition © 1974 by George W. Crane. pp. 678-680. (Bolding in original. Bracketing mine.) ---
**Author:** ![Nansbread1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Nansbread1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nansbread1)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/73 "2016-02-27T20:34:41Z")
Thanks Dougie Monty. That was a good read ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/74 "2016-02-27T21:18:53Z")
The edition we used in the psychology course was from about 1967. The edition I quoted from WAS published in 1974.:o ---
**Author:** ![Rune](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e68b1a/32.png) [@Rune](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rune)\ **Post date:** [February 27, 2016, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/75 "2016-02-27T23:59:28Z")
> [@clairobscur](#): > > I don’t think it’s an interesting idea. Take the time to consider people you know personnally, and I’m pretty sure that, like me, you’ll think of a significant number of not very bright people who are an asset and bring positive things into this world, and a significant number of smart people we would be better off without. > We have way more worrying issues to solve and more urgent tasks than improving the population’s average IQ. It’s interesting because China has already been talking about doing something like this, and it is practised to some degree in the West with for instance donor sperm (where some companies allow you to select for IQ), and it’s probably going to happen sooner or later in a more comprehensive and controlled fashion. And it’s interesting to speculate what kind of society this will lead to. Also it’s interesting, because the exact opposite may be happening, that we have created a society which selects for less intelligence. In particular intelligent women seem to be extremely dysgenic, moreso than intelligent men. And what will be the consequence of that? Perhaps we’ll have steadily more stupid population, or we’ll see an increasing intelligence gap between the sexes. ---
**Author:** ![Daylate](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9dc877/32.png) [@Daylate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Daylate)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2016, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/76 "2016-02-28T03:05:21Z")
It is interesting to note that Oliver Wendell Holmes, the revered Supreme Court Justice, author, poet, etc., etc., etc, was an enthusiastic proponent of eugenics. ---
**Author:** ![dougie\_monty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/439d5e/32.png) [@dougie\_monty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dougie_monty)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2016, 3:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/77 "2016-02-28T03:42:33Z")
> [@Daylate](#): > > It is interesting to note that Oliver Wendell Holmes, the revered Supreme Court Justice, author, poet, etc., etc., etc, was an enthusiastic proponent of eugenics. The author and poet was the father of the justice. I don’t know which one was the proponent of eugenics. ---
**Author:** ![andros](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e480ec/32.png) [@andros](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/andros)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2016, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/78 "2016-02-28T16:31:31Z")
> [@Nansbread1](#): > > Thanks Dougie Monty. That was a good read “Good” in the sense of astounding, repulsive, and depressing, certainly. ---
**Author:** ![drewder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/57b2e6/32.png) [@drewder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewder)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2016, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/79 "2016-02-28T17:18:45Z")
Should humans with low IQ be… treated with the respect due to all of humanity, yes they should. ---
**Author:** ![Nansbread1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Nansbread1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nansbread1)\ **Post date:** [February 28, 2016, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204/80 "2016-02-28T17:23:48Z")
> [@andros](#): > > “Good” in the sense of astounding, repulsive, and depressing, certainly. I thought it was thought provoking. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/should-humans-with-low-iq-be/747204.md?page=5)