Recently I read an article that suggests political, religious, and sexual behaviors are linked to intelligence. Liberalism, atheism, and male sexual exclusivity, it states, are associated with a higher IQ. The average person with these traits has a higher IQ of 6 to 11 points, which is significant but not drastic. At first I thought this was odd, because these are the opposite traits of our early ancestors. It turns out that this is exactly the reason why these things lead to a higher IQ. Intelligent human beings desire to be elite and superior than other human beings, and these beliefs set them apart from the crowd.
Traditionally human ancestors have cared most about the survival of their offspring and those closest to them. On the contrary, liberals are more concerned with total strangers. This goes against evolutionary patterns, showing that those who go against old ways are more likely to be intelligent.
Also, atheists contradict religion, a part of human life since ancient times. New studies suggest that religion does not help humans survive, but gives them a reason for their paranoia. Not being involved with any religion allows humans to further speculate on life, studies say.
Lastly, male humans historically have had many sexual partners to reproduce as much as possible. Again, having only one partner goes against what humans have historically done.
Although this general trend may be true, surely every liberal or atheist is not smarter than every conservative or religious person. Personally, I am Catholic and more conservative than liberal, but I can see why this study may be true. As the article states, "the data should not be used to stereotype or make assumptions about people," no matter what their views are.
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"New studies suggest that religion does not help humans survive, but gives them a reason for their paranoia."
ReplyDeleteThat's not really a study, per say, it's more of an exaggeration of what studies have shown (the article didn't literally mean paranoia, but it is true that religion causes people to worry more about their actions in one way or another). 'Paranoia' could more accurately be referred to as the 'Santa Claus Effect,' which is the feeling a person might get if they're considering (or have the opportunity of) doing something against their religion while no one's around to watch them (ex: shoplifting). While they may have every self-serving reason to commit the action and will in all likeliness not be punished by other living beings, they will feel watched by a deity in their conscience, and they will consider spiritual punishments (ex: hell) that far outweigh the benefits of committing their self-serving action. In our evolutionary history this would have been beneficial to prevent people from breaking laws and to hold societies together in a more cooperative way. But then the negative side of this might be, as the article mentions, holding smaller groups more closer together to be more caring of local community rather than total strangers. This might not be so good of a thing when it comes to more "global citizenship," although that's a generalization.