This again

I find it difficult to believe that anyone takes the idea of IQ seriously anymore. Sure there are the sad types who join up to Mensa and get their feelings of social superiority that way, but surely no body takes all that box ticking, shape comparing and word wankery as an indication of how intellectual a person is. Come on. Things have surely moved on - what next women have smaller brains and so should do all the sweeping, black people are a bit slow but have natural rythym and the Chinese really are inscrutable?

But what's this? A doctor Bruce Charlton (no honest) an evolutionary psychiatrist from Newcastle University has taken a look out of his window/done a bit of research and made the conclusion/sweeping generalisation that working class students have lower IQs than those from wealthier backgrounds and should not be expected to win places at top universities.

Of course, you're right, it's shit on so many levels and I make no apologies for sinking into the venacular. But here's his argument:

"Poor people have lower average IQ than wealthier people... and this means that a much smaller percentage of working-class people than professional-class people will be able to reach the normal entrance requirements of the most selective universities.". . . the average child from the highest social class is up to 30 times more likely to qualify for admission to a highly selective university than the average child from the lowest social class."

There's not much intelligence in Charlton's work. I have to say, his paper is really thin stuff.

I was expecting some damned well serious sociological statistics and weighty analysis. Instead

i. "Evidence to support the allegation of systematic unfairness [to university entrance] has never been presented, nevertheless the accusation has been used to fuel a populist ‘class war’ agenda."

You have to have a laugh at this - the government, (Welsh accent à la Kinnock "a Labour government!") fueling a class war agenda???? Further, 'evidence of educational unfairness has never been presented'? Really? Professor of the Obvious has reams of stuff.

ii. The use of the word 'simple' is never a good indicator of a serious paper if you think about it. 'This issue is really simple.' 'The causes of the first world war are really simple.' 'Chemistry is a really simple subject.' Einstein's proof of e equals m sea squared is well, dead simple.' 'Yet in all this debate a simple and vital fact has been missed: higher social classes have a significantly higher average IQ than lower social classes.' (Geddit?)

iii. "The exact size of the measured IQ difference varies according to the precision of definitions of social class – but in all studies I have seen, the measured social class IQ difference is substantial and of significance and relevance to the issue of university admissions."

So social class determines IQ? "In all the studies I have seen. . ."? How can he expect to get away with that? His argument here is deliberately unclear.

iv) "The existence of substantial class differences in average IQ seems to be uncontroversial and widely accepted for many decades among those who have studied the scientific literature. And IQ is highly predictive of a wide range of positive outcomes in terms of educational duration and attainment, attained income levels, and social status (see Deary – Intelligence, 2001). "

"Seems" - what gross obfuscations one can lazily hide behind this weasly word. Either it is uncontroversial - 'The earth spins on its axis.' - or it isn't - 'Witches exist.' It is not the case that those who have studied the scientific literature agree on this point. His next sentence is pure question begging. It just assumes what he is trying to prove.

v) "This means that in a meritocratic university admissions system there will be a greater proportion of higher class students than lower class students admitted to university. "

"Meritocratic"!!?? This ironic word has no place in a "scientific" document. Again, his point here is mere question begging.

vi) "What is less widely understood is that – on simple mathematical grounds – it is inevitable that the differential between upper and lower classes admitted to university will become greater the more selective is the university."

Simple mathematical grounds - that are never covered. Ah yes 'inevitability'. We just have to accept the upper clarses [sic - please] are just inherently better you know.

vii) "There have been numerous studies of IQ according to occupational social class, stretching back over many decades. In the UK, average IQ is 100 and the standard deviation is 15 with a normal distribution curve."

You might as well say that taller people deserve to go to university because tallness is also an upper class feature that follows an identical statistical distribution. It does, honest.

viii) "In general, the more precise the definition of social class, the larger will be the measured social class differences in IQ and other biological variables.
Typically, the average IQ of the highest occupational Social Class (SC) - mainly professional and senior managerial workers such as professors, doctors and bank managers - is 115 or more when social class is measured precisely, and about 110 when social class is measured less precisely (eg. mixing-in lower status groups such as teachers and middle managers). "

Here is the nub of the issue - remember seeing 'University Challenge' on TV and wondered why Oxbridge won all the time? OK ok smart arse, they cheat by having hundreds of colleges all competing at the same time - but it goes deeper than that - the people who set the questions belong to the same social mix as the Oxbridge chaps and gals in the studio. It's that fucking obvious. If Lenin of lenin's Tomb set the questions, us lefties would win hands down. So of course the profeesional classes are going to do well in this type of parlour exercise. It's what they waste their time doing in their leisure time. And that's before all the good food, quiet and coaching that they get too.

ix) "By comparison, the average IQ of the lowest social class of unskilled workers is about 90 when measured precisely, or about 95 when measured less precisely (eg. mixing-in higher social classes such as foremen and supervisors or jobs requiring some significant formal qualification or training)."

IQ is not a scientific measurement of some illusive mental 'ether'. It's a social fix that forms part of the wider 'matrix' of social exclusion and exploitation that forms the fabric of our everday lives. This last paragraph is nothing but an ugly tautology. It says, really, "The intelligence measuring system that is designed to exclude the lower orders finds that the lower orders are of lower intelligence and thereby are right to be excluded." Yeh, really scientific.

x) "The non-symmetrical distribution of high and low social class around the average of 100 is probably due to the fact that some of the highest IQ people can be found doing unskilled jobs (such as catering or labouring) but the lowest IQ people are very unlikely to be found doing selective-education-type professional jobs (such as medicine, architecture, science or law)."

"Probably" - do some fucking research you idle get. So there are no 'stupid' architects - clearly our trick cyclist hasn't lived in a tower block in Stoke or been misrepresented by a duff solicitor.

He drones on and the analysis by now is hopelessy flawed - even he recognises it,

"Naturally, this simple analysis is based on several assumptions, each of which could be challenged and adjusted; and further factors could be introduced. However, the take-home-message is simple. When admissions are assumed to be absolutely meritocratic, social class IQ differences of plausible magnitude lead to highly significant effects on the social class ratios of students at university when compared with the general population." [my emphasis - do I need to go on?]

His conclusion is the utterly lazy and conformist one of

"In other words, with a fully-meritocratic admissions policy we should expect to see a differential in favour of the highest social classes relative to the lowest social classes at all universities, and this differential would become very large at a highly-selective university such as Oxford or Cambridge.
The highly unequal class distributions seen in elite universities compared to the general population are unlikely to be due to prejudice or corruption in the admissions process. On the contrary, the observed pattern is a natural outcome of meritocracy. Indeed, anything other than very unequal outcomes would need to be a consequence of non-merit-based selection methods."

So equality is basically unatural and the lower orders are (near enough for this Dr.) a different species. It is an utterly worthless paper - indeed it is not research as there is no fucking research involved. He should really go out into the world and find something more worthwhile to do with his time. Even if you have an IQ of 200 why should you be excluded from the pleasures of being a porter in a hospital - after all if you're paid a living social wage you should enjoy it. Further, what is the connection between finding the next number in the series, the odd one out, the cat is to rabbit as dickhead is to a) carpenter, b) evolutionary psychiatrists c) car d) lasagne and being a good doctor or a good lawyer (if that's not a contradiction in terms).

IQ is bollocks

And that's giving him the benefit of the doubt. Further, giving him the disadvantage of the doubt as it were, IQ is not really a very scientific tool to be flinging about. It's one of those urban myths that has never gone away - that there is some 'objective' intelligence 'behind' all social culturalisation that finally determines whether one is to be a bin man or a rocket scientist (not that there is anything inherently better about the latter, but Brucey is bound to think so). It's the next 'level' up from believing in the soul. It's essentially Plato's Republic with a desperately vulgar scientific gloss.

All IQ really assess is how good you are at doing IQ tests. Thus, you can train yourself and get better at the sad little puzzles they give you to do. Now imagine a lonely working class girl who spent her time doing just that and took her IQ 'score' up to 156 say - would she get into Oxbridge? (Answer a) no b) yes c) the train will take 45 minutes d) the circle with the black square in it) Further, what is Prince Charle's IQ - assuming for the moment that the concept means something - I'm guessing but I'd think that him and his family wouldn't trouble the scorer unduly and they ended up at Bolton Polytechnic. O no sorry Eton and Cambridge.

Further, "Alan Ryan, warden of New College, Oxford, said the relationship of IQ to academic success was "very much looser than Dr Charlton imagines". [no shit - REL]
He said: "All the evidence suggests that measured IQ is a function of innate endowment and nurture; high-IQ children in the lowest income quintile do less well in IQ tests over time, while low-IQ children in the highest income quintile do better. The most obvious explanation of the class differential in Oxbridge intake has nothing to do with IQ and everything to do with the ability of private schools to get their students three As at A level."

If someone at Oxford can work that out why is Dr. Charlton making a chimp of himself excreting such sewage research? Well, these buggers have to publish and make a name for themselves. They can't get by on IQ after all - they have to, you know, make stuff up and get it out there.

All this would be just knock about nonsense were it not for it to keep getting taken seriously and for it just putting the splinter of doubt in enough people's minds so as to not bother competing with the upper class bastards for the next uni. place.

Because it's all about competition for education recources: "Gemma Tumelty, president of the NUS, said: "Of course, social inequality shapes people's lives long before they leave school, but the higher education sector cannot be absolved of its responsibility to ensure that students from all social backgrounds are given the opportunity to fulfil their potential."

Bruce Charlton should hang his head in shame. He has exposed himself as a old Tory ractionary, besmirched the good name of Newcastle University with his awful style his awful paper and his rubbish analysis and pulled 'evolutionary psychiatry' down to the level of scientology.

Good work fella.