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Bigger Brains Make Smarter People Study Says
udderly writes "People with bigger brains are smarter according
to a Virginia Commonwealth University industrial and organizational
psychologist, Michael A. McDaniel, Ph.D.
McDaniel, who is a professor in management at
VCU's School of Business. He reviewed 26 previous studies comparing brain size
and intelligence and found that brain volume has a strong correlation to
intelligence. According to McDaniel, 'for all age and sex groups, it
is now very clear that brain volume and intelligence are related.' So, how
big of a hat do you wear?"
When did this place become the Drudge Report outlet mall? The last three stories have been on Drudge for a day.
Ok, I officially resign.
I'd suggest that the study is probably right about the average larger brain providing its owner with a higher intelligence than the average average-sized brain.
However, neuron count in specific brain areas would seem to be more significant, and higher densities would provide more neurons/volume and therefore enable a smaller brain to outperform a larger one.
Using hat size to select job applicants, as the linked article suggests, is probably not a good idea.
It is more likely the number of folds in the brain that predict intelligence, since folds imply a more complex wiring pattern.
This study would probably find a correlation between number of folds and brain size.
No, it highlights the problem of using the results of this study to determine things like Princeton admissions ...
German scientists already knew that the bumps on your head could demonstrate (with a very high accuracy ;) how smart you are. What we need now is something more "scientific" like: how our neurons act with one another or how wired the different parts of the brain can be...
Jeez, I hope not all Ph.D's are landed as easily as this guy's must have been. This is nothing more than modern phrenology. Here's a link to the actual publication: http://www.vcu.edu/uns/Releases/2005/june/McDaniel -Big%20Brain.pdf
It's mostly a literature review, which obviously attempts to use the 'majority must be right' fallacy to some mysterious end. The guy's an 'industrial psychologist,' though, so go figure.
To argue something so bold and broad that the size of the brain is an indicator for intelligence is frighteningly naive. If you leave your computer for a second and go meet a few people, you'll quickly realize that people with little heads have no problem outsmarting people with wide hats. This is about on par with 'people with big noses have big johnsons.' Don't read this publication if you're expecting any insight on anything other than a statistical analysis of random literature. You won't find any discussion of neuroplasticity here. I've a question I'd like to ask this guy: how come people 3 feet tall are smarter than you?
Jupiter is fucking huge, but let me assure you, I'd rather be back home. Bigger is not always better.
Shame on Slashdot for featuring this nonsense. Your homework for the weekend is to read "The Mismeasure of Man" by Stephen Jay Gould. Bad ideas from the 19th century should not be featured as science in the 21st century.
It's just the same old bullshit. Oh, so brain size correlates with intelligence. What a wonderful 19th century hypothesis. They've been trying to prove exactly this for centuries. Funny how conclusions predate evidence. But I'm sure they've nailed it this time.
Okay, before I go off on them, we've made advances since then... So apparently we've got a new, rigorous definition of intelligence, that they found a unique way to measure... Wait... it's just the same old standardized tests which use the same circular logic to "prove" they test intelligence. If you take a bunch of intelligence tests and average them, you get a vector that this test maps well to, therefore this test tests intelligence.
In the article, they say that the correlation they observed between brain size and test scores means that intelligence scales with brain size, and that the correlation also proves that the tests actually are measuring intelligence. What kind of nonsense circular reasoning is this? They're begging the question of whether the test scores are truly intelligence tests to prove that brain size correlates with intelligence which proves that the tests measure intelligence...
I like how the professor is quoted as attributing all kinds of benefits to whatever intelligence he believes he is measuring, "smarter people learn quicker", without showing that this is an attribute that his tests actually test.
What bullshit. And how long until someone uses this study to "prove" that women are less intelligent than men (because on average they are smaller and thus have smaller brains), and that races like Australian aborigines are inferior because they are smaller still? My guess is about... fifteen seconds.
Einstein isn't the exception to the rule. He's the first and most obvious point to show the rule is garbage.
Where's Stephen Gould when you need him?
The enemies of Democracy are
Yeah, and if my dad were head of the CIA, I'd have good grades too.
I was really irked by the conclusion of this paper. Specifically, "Tiedmann (1836) was correct to conclude that intelligence and brain volume are meaningfully related." Now, even if we grant the premise that the current paper is correct in asserting the relationship, how does that mean that Tiedmann was justified in making the connection at the time he did? Imagine that in 1504, some monk had correctly guessed the speed of light because he figured it to be a billion times as fast as his own walking speed. Just because he came to the right conclusion doesn't mean that he was right in coming to that conclusion.
Given the state of the social sciences in the 1830's, I have a hard time believing that Tiedmann's research was anything but a mish-mash of bad techniques, preconceived bias, and probably blatant racism.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
It seems like people will reach for any conspiracy rather than accepting that which forces them to update their view about reality.
"As one other poster noted, Einstein had a brain that only fell in the range of "normal", giving lie to the theory size alone is an indicator of likely intelligence."
Einstein is just a single data point, and possibly an outlier.
Intelligence is the ability to learn and acquire knowledge. You can be the most "intelligent" person being able to solve any puzzles thrown at you, but if you can never grasp how to paint a picture or shoot a basketball, that means your ability to learn these skills are poor. Intelligence most certainly is not based fully on logic and mathematics.
Maybe not, but we all know that neither man is fit as a leader of this nation. Though your point might be interesting, it is akin to saying "Well, you all do know that Thailand has a higher GDP than Cambodia." Well, that's just wonderful, but they're both still dirt poor. So can we please all stop defending these two parties. They are both a royal clusterfuck of aristocrats more concerned about the good of their bank accounts than the good of the nation.