I don't have to address Nisbet. You need some more apologetics. I posted more raw, and up to date data, which are/remain consistent with my views. The OP and half a dozen more. And that's the way it has been, and will be here. +
Cringe. "Heritability" doesn't mean what you think it means. Heritability doesn't mean that a trait is X percent genetic. It's the proportion of total variation between individuals that's attributed to genetic variation. Heritable does not equal inheritable. That a trait has a heritability of 1 doesn't mean that its fully "genetic" and therefore immutable. This is embarrassing for you man.
On Racial differences in "IQ", I've yet to see a hereditarian address this paper: http://www.mdpi.com/2079-3200/5/1/1/htm Abstract: Some academic publications infer from studies of transracial adoptees’ IQs that East Asian adoptees raised in the West by Whites have higher IQs than Western Whites, and that White adoptees raised by Whites have higher IQs than Black adoptees raised by Whites. Those publications suggest that this is because genetic differences give East Asians a higher mean IQ than Whites, and Whites a higher mean IQ than Blacks. This paper proposes a parsimonious alternative explanation: the apparent IQ advantage of East Asian adoptees is an artifact caused by ignoring the Flynn effect and adoption’s beneficial effect on IQ, and most of the IQ disadvantage of Black adoptees disappears when one allows for attrition in the Minnesota Transracial Adoption Study, and acknowledges the results of other studies. Diagnosing these artifacts suggests a nil hypothesis: East Asian, White, and Black adoptees raised in the same environment would have similar IQs, hinting at a minimal role for genes in racial IQ differences. I'll have much more to say on "Genes for" IQ later.
Aren't YOU a hereditarian? Haven't you voiced your hereditarian view on IQ, and specifically Adoption, on your Blog you heavily link to here? https://notpoliticallycorrect.me/2016/05/13/strong-evidence-strong-argument-race-iq-and-adoption/ So are you playing Devil's Advocate, or would like some talking points? Thomas seems frenetic and confused. He admittedly only adjusts/subtracts Flynn effect numbers from non-Black IQs. (!) He uses 'East Asians' as if it's an IQ Bloc claimed by one side. It Isn't. Lynn has given us both Racial and National IQ. Southeast Asians are app 90.. NE Asians 105. By country: Laos, Cambodia, Vietnam, are 90-94 IQ, while NE Asia (J/C/K)is app 105. So when you Conflate/Average them, you Are going to get: "Drawing together this paper’s re-analyses, I conclude that East Asian adoptees raised by Western Whites score about on par with non-adopted Western Whites..." The SE Asian/NE Asian combined Average IS app the same as white. And subjects with 105 IQs probably don't benefit as much from parents with 100, while those with 85 IQs do. He uses some studies that have dubious results like Moore n=23. MTRAS still looks solid to me. That's it for now. Something like the Flu has got me. +
"The Gap is closing." --- NOT--- Pt 9,756 SAT scores improve in Ann Arbor Schools, but Achievement Gap Persists Posted Nov 2, 2017 http://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/index.ssf/2017/11/ann_arbor_schools_sat_achievem.html Ann Arbor Public Schools saw its students' average SAT scores improve this year and continue to exceed the statewide average, but some members of the board of education still were alarmed by the results. At a meeting on Oct. 25, the school board reviewed the results from the SAT taken by all high school juniors in April. Overall, the average SAT score for AAPS students improved from 1160.3 in 2016 to 1192.9 in 2017. The highest possible SAT score is 1600, and the statewide average this year was 1007.6. However, AAPS' SAT results showed the average scores for Black students, Hispanic students and special education students Dropped from 2016 to 2017. The average SAT scores for economically disadvantaged AAPS students, students who are learning English as a second language and special education students also lag behind the district-wide average. "I'm in a panic. I'll be very honest with you," said Susan Baskett, vice president of the school board. "I've been on this board for how many years. We keep changing tests, but No matter which tests they are and Who creates them, there's Always that certain group that's there." "I've been in education for 40 years, and this issue, this discrepancy between student groups and achievement, has been there for 40 years and obviously longer," said Jeff Gaynor, board secretary. "We're clearly all concerned. There's clearly no easy answers, no simple mechanical answers. We know that achievement scores can be correlated with family education and wealth. But I do think we need to look at every possible factor. We need to return to, as we said, 'courageous conversations' about Race, about class." ...... Farly extensive category breakdown by Ann Arbor schools. Race/ethnicity, Income, even English Language learners. The latter of which is ahead of blacks in 2017. Blacks now 400 points behind Asians and almost 300 vs Whites. Dropping 30 of them this year. Maybe they can add Hoops or 100m times into the test. And 944 out of 1600? Without the 400 point signing bonus, that's 544 out of 1200. Probably still make Princeton over Asians due to AA. +
As well as the Extensive evidence I posted throughout, including the NON-starving Blacks of Ann Arbor Michigan immediately above..the results Always come out the same. the Gap is NOT closing. Asian>White>Black Forget the Idiotic/nonanalogous 'Flower beds' you've been shown', as once basic nutrition is met (the soil), the differences between Races are still significant and steady for decades among the SAME Socio-economic strata, with Race being the Only Variable. Because it's GENETIC IQ is 75% HERITABLE. Math and Reading skills it turns out, Predictably NAIL the SAME number. (see OP/Wiki entry) Same Genes May Influence Reading, Math Skills: Study https://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=179399 July 9, 2014 Nearly half of the genes that affect children's reading ability also play a role in their math skills, a new study says. Researchers compared genetic data and the results of reading and math tests completed by 12-year-old children from nearly 2,800 British families. The findings revealed a significant overlap in genes that influence both reading and math abilities. The study, published July 8 in the journal Nature Communications, helps improve understanding of how genes and environment interact to influence children's learning abilities, according to the researchers. "We looked at this question in two ways, by comparing the similarity of thousands of twins, and by measuring millions of tiny differences in their DNA. Both analyses show that similar collections of subtle DNA differences are important for reading and maths," study first author Oliver Davis, of University College London, said in a school news release. "However, it's also clear just how important our life experience is in making us better at one or the other. It's this complex interplay of nature and nurture as we grow up that shapes who we are," he added. "This is the first time we estimate genetic influence on learning ability using DNA alone. The study does not point to specific genes linked to literacy or numeracy, but rather suggests that genetic influence on complex traits, like learning abilities, and common disorders, like learning disabilities, is caused by many genes of very small effect size," study co-senior author Robert Plomin, of King's College London, said in the news release. "The study also confirms findings from previous twin studies that genetic differences among children account for most of the differences between children in how easily they learn to read and to do maths," he added....[/quote] ...
It seems many, many, Brain/Neurological (and probably physical) functions, including IQ, Math/Reading Skills, and now epilepsy, are 75% HERITABLE. Understanding Epilepsy Dr Sheetal Sharda, AUG 28 2018 https://www.deccanherald.com/living/understanding-epilepsy-689582.html More than 10 million persons suffer from epilepsy in India. Epilepsy is one of the most common neurological disorders causing unprovoked recurrent seizures. There are about 70 million people around the globe affected by epilepsy and more than 10 million in India. Genetic causes are responsible for almost 70-80% of epilepsy cases and in the remaining 20-30% cases, acquired conditions such as stroke, tumour or head ... Most things may turn out to be app this number. It seems that way in atheletics, and maybe even higher. `
That's a big part of the problem when Jay cites personal emails. We get these snippets lacking context such as data source. I'm going to assume it's the one data cite that Nisbutt has used before regarding "proving" that the IQ gap is closing, which is one study from Dickens and Flynn published in 2006 which he touted in his embarrassingly-bad book titled, "Intelligence and How to Get it: Why Schools and Cultures Count" and cited that study on page 100. As far as reasoning, Nisbutt doesn't offer why one (disputed) study proves that, but that's his evidence. One study. Jay has repeatedly posted an email snippet from Graves citing a 50/50 environment/genetic heritability with intelligence sans an academic source from which Graves drew that statement from. For all I know, Jay told him IQ heritability was 50/50 and Graves commented based on that. Who knows. Either way, it's wrong.
I guess the Asians must have some incredible genes. I think that good math skills requires a good foundation of study starting from early childhood.
They don't. I was disinterested in applying myself in math from K-12 in spite of that the Iowa Test of Basic Skills showed I had an aptitude for it. I developed an interest in it later as an adult and did well in my studies.
IQ is Genetic and 75% Heritable. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heritability_of_IQ#Estimates As Is Math and Reading 75% Genetic http://www.politicalforum.com/index.php?threads/math-reading-75-genetic.472120/ Now, of course, and as was predictable and predicted, (incl by me), Genetics is finding more and more of the genes that evidence the fact. Enough so, that it is now testable, and included in some personal DNA testing Not perfect, but up from 1% to 10%, and Hundreds of Genes now. I remember when it was a single gene, and less than 1% just a few years ago. And many more are coming. MIT Technology Review DNA Tests are coming, but it might not be smart to take one. https://www.technologyreview.com/s/...coming-but-it-might-not-be-smart-to-take-one/ Scientists have linked Hundreds of Genes to Intelligence. One psychologist says it’s time to test school kids. by Antonio Regalado April 2, 2018 Ready for a world in which a $50 DNA test can predict your odds of earning a PhD or forecast which toddler gets into a selective preschool? Robert Plomin, a behavioral geneticist, says that’s exactly what’s coming. For decades genetic researchers have sought the hereditary factors behind intelligence, with little luck. But now gene studies have finally gotten big enough—and hence powerful enough—to zero in on genetic differences linked to IQ. A year ago, no gene had ever been tied to performance on an IQ test. Since then, more than 500 have, thanks to gene studies involving more than 200,000 test takers. Results from an experiment correlating one million people’s DNA with their academic success are due at any time. The discoveries mean we can now read the DNA of a young child and get a notion of how intelligent he or she will be, says Plomin, an American based at King’s College London, where he leads a long-term study of 13,000 pairs of British twins. Plomin outlined the DNA IQ test scenario in January in a paper titled “The New Genetics of Intelligence,” making a case that parents will use direct-to-consumer tests to predict kids’ mental abilities and make schooling choices, a concept he calls precision education. As of now, the predictions are not highly accurate. The DNA variations that have been linked to test scores explain less than 10 percent of the intelligence differences between the people of European ancestry who’ve been studied. Even so, MIT Technology Review found that aspects of Plomin’s testing scenario are already happening. At least three online services, including GenePlaza and DNA Land, have started offering to quantify anyone’s genetic IQ from a spit sample. Others are holding back. The largest company offering direct-to-consumer DNA health reports, 23andMe, says it’s not telling people their brain rating out of concern the information would be poorly received."...." [.....] `
Oh so Nisbutt's argument that "we can't find intelligence genes" from 2009 is irrelevant outdated junk and shouldn't be used in internet debates? You can't do that if there's a big environmental effect on lifespan IQ...
Absolutely, I read to my oldest child nearly every night for years when she was small as just one component of her academic regimen. She scored in the 98th percentile and above on IQ tests as a child, went to a top tier university (consistently ranked in the top five nationally) and works as a Mechanical Engineer. We are African-American. I didn't spend as much time reading at night with the younger ones (your time gets stretched when you have more children) but I still invested a good amount into their at home tutoring. We took plenty of old fashioned trips to the library and had home school sessions, even though they each attended public schools. I believe in saving the money for college, if you live in a decent public school system. The second scored in the 90th percentile on scholastic aptitude tests and is studying Biochemistry. He's in his sophomore year at a top ranked state college. He wants to be a physician. My youngest one is only 15. She did almost as well as the others but she never liked to read. The older two scored at the gifted level on the IQ tests taken in elementary school. The youngest missed it by just a few points, so I had her enrolled in a summer school class, towards the end of middle school, so that she could start high school at the same level as the older children. As a result, she also was able to get on the advanced math track and she is excelling in her math classes. Although she didn't get their "naturally", the extra effort erased the gap. Birth order, personality traits, nutrition, available resources, genetics, positive influences and other environmental factors each make a difference in academic performance. Resources and motivation are the biggest determining factors for most people. These people who invest obscene amounts of energy into trying to prove that their group is smarter than another group, just put their insecurities on display. Sheesh - get a life.
You're not familiar with the studies. Reading to your kid every night has no benefit. To a degree but if you're trying to posit that an IQ of 80 can be overcome by these outside things so they'll perform like someone with an IQ of 110, that's just way off base. The is a large genetic component to IQ that emerges in the teen years. Interventions on populations of five yaer olds are not lasting in terms of IQ scores but they can certainly aid in terms of behavior. As far as my discussions on the subject go, my sole reason is that I'm tired of white people being blamed for the lack of socioeconomic progress of low average IQ groups. It's gotten to the point where even the IQ gap itself between whites and certain populations is blamed on whites, as if whites "made" them that way. In today's political climate, unequal outcomes are always blamed on some white supremacist conspiracy theory du jour. I see no reason to lie down and accept that. Do you?
This post has No meaning or weight. It's completely Personal ANECDOTE: a common debate Fallacy. 1. We don't know if any detail you include is true. 2. If true, we don't know if the effort actually helped. 3. Interventions such as (but not limited to) 'head start' are well known to be short-lived, and people tend to return to/towards their mean Group IQ. 4. But your family efforts are to be commended. `
Reading to your kids has ENORMOUS benefit. All engaged and focused interactions with young children fire the synapses .. the very building blocks of intelligence. FTR, IQ is a factor of the quantity and quality of the focused engagement a child receives from birth til around age 8 .. but in particular in infancy and early childhood. Even when a child misses this early synaptic stimulation, it CAN be applied later with reasonable results.
You are correct. PSEUDOSCIENCE begins with a hypothesis— usually one which is appealing emotionally, and spectacularly implausible— and then looks only for items which appear to support it. Conflicting evidence is ignored. Notice how often, when you are asked by a friend about what should be a question of fact if the topic were not pseudoscience, the opening phrase is, “Do you believe in ESP?” (or flying saucers, or prophecy, or Bigfoot)... not, is the evidence good, but rather, do you believe, without raising dull questions of evidence. Generally speaking, the aim of pseudoscience is to rationalize strongly held beliefs, rather than to investigate and find out what’s actually going on, or to test various possibilities. Pseudoscience specializes in jumping to “congenial conclusions,” grinding ideological axes, appealing to pre-conceived ideas and to widespread misunderstandings. Not just Creationists, but 20th Century pseudoscientists of all flavors, from J. B. Rhine and Immanuel Velikovsky to Rupert Sheldrake, have underlying their claims and assertions an anachronistic world-view that essentially rejects all or most of the tested, reliable findings of science as “unacceptably materialistic!” The general public tends to view pseudoscientists as “mavericks” who are working slightly beyond the “accepted” boundaries of science. In fact, nothing could be further from the truth. Pseudoscientists invariably represent a world-view which is not simply unscientific or pre-scientific, but rather militantly antiscientific. - Rory Coker Once we identify the motive for why people think the way they do we can better understand why they perform so many mental gymnastics and commit so many logical fallacies in support of an indefensible position. Don't let pseudoscientific, racist propaganda discourage you from reading to your kids and teaching them to read to your Grandchildren. The idea that you have some kind of noble cause for opposing environmental explanations for group differences in IQ is sheer nonsense. White Egalitarians have no problem acknowledging that the historical atrocities of the past committed by their ancestors and their culture have had a negative effect on the standard of living of people living in Western societies. IQ scores and other measures of intelligence can be depressed by poor nurturing environment but that doesn't mean that intervention programs, value for education and good work ethic can't boost IQ or allow people from underprivileged backgrounds to become successful. Why should we believe that you are an objective observer? 1. "There are already Genetic IQ tests, several, as HUNDREDS of Genes have been found that affect intelligence in the in just the last few years. (Plomin et al) As with just about every other trait/disease/etc, there WILL indeed be group Race Differences." - Taxonomy26 2. "YOU were read as being about 3/4 sub-Saharan by Both services, and indeed that is about the average for American Blacks. I have used many times. Only proving there ARE Major/measurable Racial Groups. and they ergo can be tested." - Taxonomy26 3. "Nor does your volume-adding/fake substance, anecdotal, and Unverified NO number, Personal IQ claim have anything to do with this debate" - Taxonomy26 I see no reason to believe that any evidence that invalidates your argument would be acceptable to you after these statements. People who raise their children responsibly and see them grow up to become successful have the life experience of someone who knows they raised kids right and should be encouraged to share stories of what they did to contribute to their success. Arborville's parenting techniques are consistent with the skills that intelligence researchers have stated boosts IQ (Nisbett, 2012).
NOTHING in the OP or the referenced studies establishes any connection between race and genetic math/reading abilities. In fact nowhere in the studies was there any mention of race at all. The OP is taking the results entirely OUT OF CONTEXT in order to promote a nefarious agenda of disparaging racial stereotypes that have already been DEBUNKED by genuine scientific studies.
You are correct and this is done intentionally. They know that Scientific Racism has no credibility in academia so they try to avoid sources that can directly be labeled as racist (e.g. Pioneer Fund Grantees and scholars making blatantly racist statements) in favor of research that is more widely accepted (e.g. the high heritability of IQ, the existence of average racial IQ gaps and genetic markers being ancestry informative). I don't have any problem with the conclusions of the study in the opening post. Intelligence is highly heritable and substantially genetic. That is not controversial. If your biological parents are good readers and math whizzes odds are high that you will be too. If you read to them and encourage them to read and take academics seriously even better. The idea that a child born to parents with high IQs can simply excel at school without a good nurturing environment is sheer nonsense. Spoiled and abused children fail to be successful all the time. Some people also overcome bad environments on their own or by seeking more positive influences. The discussion is more complicated than Group A is smart and Group B is dumb because of genetic differences.
Agreed, that was my reading of the studies too. My father was an orphan and my mother was the daughter of an orphan and both came from working class backgrounds. However my father was a math wiz at school and graduated at 15. There was no money for college and he still had his siblings to support so he went to work instead. From him I obtained my love of reading and STEM and I inherited his math abilities but I took it in a different direction. There was no money for me to go to college either so I started at the bottom rung as a computer operator and worked myself up from there. I obtained my degree by attending college at night. We read to my daughter from the day she was born and we put her through college and now she has both an IT career and is a published author. While the above is anecdotal it does corroborate the intelligence inheritability findings in the study and that it can be nurtured. Had the cSES been less nurturing the outcomes for all of us could have been very different as we can witness all across America.
This is hysterical, as each of you deniers Contradict each other. Your father was an orphan ""Math Wiz at school and graduated at 15"" with no one to 'read to Him.' Completely contradicting Crank and another 'it's-good-fathering' poster, and all the other race deniers/environmentalists. He had in INNATE ability. As a fellow Natural Math Prodigy, I highly empathize with his experience. 1. As to Heritability, it has to be Family Heritable FIRST before one can claim or demonstrate it is Consistently extended family or Group transmitted. 2. And we have 100 years of Race-IQ tests to demonstrate heritability. ('Black-White IQ/SAT basically stuck at 1 SD despite 50 Years of large social changes) (And the Almost never mentioned, Less Loaded, Asian-White IQ ALSO retaining it's Gap) 3. And even the APA (along with Journal for Blacks in Higher education). admits it is NOT Socioeconomic. 4. In fact, Whites at the lowest rung of income outscore Blacks at Every Rung of income. (JBHI above) 5. Transracial adoption studies also show that even with equal parenting, Blacks come out lower than Asians/Whites. And of course and again.... "Egalitarianism" IS "Pseudoscience": an "Emotionally Appealing Hypothesis" that all races have identical IQs (most would Like to be believe) Despite our obvious Physical and Internal adaptations to much more varied local conditions than most other animals/mammals, and leaving humans more Strongly Morphologically Marked than Most other subspecies. But it's "spectacularly implausible" that Every group on Every continent developed the Identical intelligence. Makes no sense if you believe in Evo, or even if you don't!. James Watson, Nobel Prize Winner co-discovering DNA http://www.gnxp.com/blog/2007/10/james-watson-tells-inconvenient-truth_296.php ...In his interview with the Times on Oct. 14th, we learned that: ... [Watson] is "inherently gloomy about the prospect of Africa" because "all our social policies are based on the fact that their intelligence is the same as ours - whereas all the Testing says Not really", and I know that this "hot potato" is going to be difficult to address." These thoughts were a continuation of an important theme in his new book Avoid Boring People: ... "there is No firm reason to anticipate that the intellectual capacities of peoples geographically Separated in their evolution should prove to have evolved Identically. Our Wanting to reserve equal powers of reason as some universal heritage of humanity will Not be enough to make it so." `
Of course every argument that Taxonomy26 has made has been addressed and he doesn't have any new ones (Argument by Repetition). We know from the world's top intelligence researchers that the Black-White IQ gap has actually been reduced by about 0.33 standard deviation since the 1970s and the current Black American IQ average is estimated to be 92 or 93 (Nisbett, 2012). So the idea that the Black-White IQ gap has remained consistent and is still 85 or 1 SD in 2018 is false. 100 years of IQ test scores is meaningless. All attempts to rank groups of people by intelligence are based on a pseudoscientific premise. Psychometric testing was also used to claim that Jews and several immigrants from European ethnic groups were mentally inferior to Anglo-Saxon White Americans in the past and scores on mental tests supported this conclusion. Likewise recent research on Asian-White IQ gaps have determined that they are caused by cultural differences. The Minnesota Transracial Adoption Study is often cherry-picked by racial hereditarians to prove that the Black-White IQ gap is caused by genetic differences. The authors of the study themselves give reasons why this was not the cause which was pointed out to Rushton by Graves in their debate. The Minnesota Transracial Adoption Study is discussed around the 1:33:55 mark of the video: Basically Graves argues, citing the research of Sandra Scarr who is one of the authors of the study, that adoption studies can not reliably control for the environment or culture in the ways that Rushton suggested because there are variables that affect IQ score such as psychological factors related to racism. Richard Nisbett also provided several problems with the Minnesota Transracial Adoption Study itself in his book which shows that it was methodologically flawed and can not test the genetic or environmental hypotheses for the cause of racial differences in IQ: 1. Selective Placement - Adoption agencies may have engaged in selective placement which could have put Black adoptees in families of lower social class. 2. Unknown IQ of Natural Parents - Since the natural parents of the adopted children was not known the IQs of the White children could have been above the average of the White American IQ mean granting them higher genotypic IQ or the Black children could have been below the Black American IQ mean resulting in them having lower genotypic IQ. 3. Late Adoption Age - Black children were adopted at a substantially later age which has a negative effect on IQ. 4. Foster Homes - The Black children had longer placement in foster homes than the White children which also has a negative effect on IQ. 5. Preadoptive Placement - The preadoptive placement of the Black children was worse than the White children which can also negatively impact IQ. 6. Psychological disturbance from identity issues - According to Sandra Scarr the Black children in the study had an unusual degree of psychological disturbance as a result of being raised by White families. Some of the kids made comments about looking in the mirror and seeing a Black face while knowing deep down that they were really White. Others didn't understand why they weren't placed with a Black family and felt that they didn't belong. I brought this research up to Taxonomy26 before and he had no rebuttal. - EgalitarianJay The continued reference to James Watson is meaningless. Just because Watson is a geneticist doesn't mean he is qualified to speak on the subject of race, genetics and intelligence (Appeal to Authority Fallacy). Watson has done no original research on Race and Intelligence. He declined an interview with Rageh Omaar for the documentary Race and Intelligence: Science's Last Taboo admitting that he wasn't qualified to speak on the subject and that his opinions about being "gloomy about African intelligence" were entirely based on reading a book by Richard Lynn. "No one I ever deal with in the intelligence business takes Lynn seriously. He is certainly a very foolish man and many consider him to be dishonest." - Richard Nisbett Aside from that and his interview with Henry Louis Gates Jr. where he basically argued that racial stereotypes might have a genetic basis Watson also sold his Nobel Prize Medal at an auction for money after he resigned from his position as President of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. In other words Watson is an unqualified sellout who ruined his reputation worse than Lance Armstrong when he admitted to doping in order to win his Tour de France titles. In addition to his lack of credibility and tarnishing his reputation as a scientist Watson actually is notorious for making comments that support eugenics. "If you could find the gene which determines sexuality and a woman decides she doesn't want a homosexual child, well, let her....We already accept that most couples don't want a Down child. You would have to be crazy to say you wanted one, because that child has no future." - James Watson James Watson, proponent of Scientific Racism and using genetic tests to identify and abort gay babies. I would like Taxonomy26 to comment on the above comment of Watson and whether he feels this is a good policy. Should we use genetic intelligence tests to promote abortion of people of color too? PSEUDOSCIENCE always achieves a reduction to absurdity if pursued far enough. Maybe dowsers can somehow sense the presence of water or minerals under a field, but almost all claim they can dowse equally well from a map! Maybe Uri Geller is “psychic,” but are his powers really beamed to him on a radio link with a flying saucer from the planet Hoova, as Uri used to claim? Maybe plants are “psychic,” but why does a bowl of (inorganic) mud respond in exactly the same way, in the same bogus “experiment?” A local psychic says she can commune mentally with your pet— but she also says a photo or fax or computer-printout image of the pet works just as well as the pet itself for her communing! - Rory Coker We're not blank slates in terms of genetic potential. However maximizing our potential depends very much on nurturing environment. The better your environment the more likely you are to realize the potential your genes will allow and there are deleterious genes related to mental disorders that can have an effect on brain development and intelligence. But rather than promote propaganda to discriminate against people who are mentally ill or disabled we should seek cures for these pathologies and accommodate them in the meantime.
