The leptokurtic distribution of IQ in women is due to sexual selection

OK.  I will translate that into plain English.  The academic article below has become immensely controversial because of foolish feminist attempts to suppress it (They have in fact assured it of widespread attention) -- so I will just try to translate the controversial part.

For a start, I disagree with the article.  I think it assumes what it has to prove.  It starts with what may be a true premise: That women in general are fussy maters.  They are much more fussy than men about who they will partner with long term. That's the "sexual selection" part.

And the "leptokurtic" part refers to the fact that female IQ scores tend to be bunched around the average, with few very dumb women and few very bright women when compared to men.  That's the bit that fires feminists up with rage. That there are fewer women than men at the top of the IQ range is totally against their ideology.  They are, however, barking at the moon in their rage -- because the leptokurtic distribution of IQ among females has been found repeatedly for around 100 years.  It is as firm a finding as any in science.  It is a fact and no objecting to it will make it go away.  So they are wasting their breath in condemning it.

But, given the finding, where do we go from there?  The theory below is heavily mathematical and I cheerfully admit that I am a mathematical dunce.  I get by but only barely. So, maybe I have got the theory below all wrong, but what I get from it is that women will only accept the upper end of male desirability.  Low desirability males will never find a reproductive partner.  The theory then goes on to assume that desirable men come from a more varied distribution and that mating with them will reinforce that varied distribution.

That seems nuts to me.  As far as I can see, the only effect of women discriminating heavily in favour of desirable men should be to raise the average level of desirability.

The authors below set out their basic premise as follows:

"In a species with two sexes A and B, both of which are needed for reproduction, suppose that sex A is relatively selective, i.e., will mate only with a top tier (less than half ) of B candidates. Then from one generation to the next, among subpopulations of B with comparable average attributes, those with greater variability will tend to prevail over those with lesser variability. Conversely, if A is relatively non-selective, accepting all but a bottom fraction (less than half ) of the opposite sex, then subpopulations of B with lesser variability will tend to prevail over those with comparable means and greater variability"

So I think their very starting point is wrong.  Where they say: "those with greater variability will tend to prevail over those with lesser variability", I would say that "variability will gradually decline".  I would be delighted if someone could explain where I am wrong.

Abstract only below.  Full article at the link


An Evolutionary Theory for the Variability Hypothesis

Theodore P. Hill

Abstract

An elementary mathematical theory based on “selectivity” is proposed to address a question raised by Charles Darwin, namely, how one gender of a sexually dimorphic species might tend to evolve with greater variability than the other gender. Briefly, the theory says that if one sex is relatively selective then from one generation to the next, more variable subpopulations of the opposite sex will tend to prevail over those with lesser variability; and conversely, if a sex is relatively non-selective, then less variable subpopulations of the opposite sex will tend to prevail over those with greater variability. This theory makes no assumptions about differences in means between the sexes, nor does it presume that one sex is selective and the other non-selective. Two mathematical models are presented: a discrete-time one-step statistical model using normally distributed fitness values; and a continuous-time deterministic model using exponentially distributed fitness levels.



1 comment:

  1. I would not be surprised if the premise is true, females are generally fussy maters compared to the divine gender. Nor would I be surprised if the following statement is true: people are generally stupid. In other news, Tom Arnold has recently started a TV show called The Hunt For The Trump Tapes. The name implies he is taking the high road.

    ReplyDelete

All comments containing Chinese characters will not be published as I do not understand them