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Many Western countries began immigration policies without feeling any need to monitor the long-term results. Indeed, many considered that immigration was an expedient response to labour shortages, and that the labourers, such as Turkish guest-workers in Germany, would probably eventually want to return home with their earnings at retirement. The United Kingdom seems to have... Read More
The British Broadcasting Corporation is one of the world’s largest (35,000 employees including part-timers) and best funded news organisations, against which few can compete. Not only does it have a budget which in 2018-19 amounted to £4.0 billion ($5.6 billion), but it is virtually guaranteed the continuation of that level of income by a government... Read More
If you select for some characteristic, and find that groups differ on other characteristics, it is natural to assume that the variable you selected might be causal. For example, if you select on the basis of genetics, and find differences, it would be understandable if you thought that genetics accounted for the other differences. Equally,... Read More
One hypothesis about the Anglo-Saxon world is that Britain 1.0 has been superseded by Britain 2.0, such that the latter gets updated first, and the former always lags behind, under threat of being discontinued. As a consequence, the US fashions in race relations have late echoes in the UK. Here are two little stories about... Read More
I recently commented on the UK report “Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparitiesâ€, which dared to suggest that systemic racism was not the major cause of race differences in Britain. The wave of criticism continues. One line of attack is that the Commission did not give sufficient weight to studies which show that racial minorities... Read More
An official UK report “Commission on Race and Ethnic Disparities†has got into trouble by coming to the wrong conclusions. It has stated that the UK is not a racist state, and although there are instances of racism, in most ways the UK is a model of non-racism. The report says that the main source... Read More
Max Roser does great work at “Our World in Dataâ€, virtually all of which I read and retweet approvingly. He has just written a paper calculating the amount of economic growth which will be required to lift people out of poverty. Lots and lots of growth, he argues. I think it likely that lots of... Read More
I do not like the sound of “blood clotsâ€. Many European leaders don’t like the sound of them either. Not nice, as my Granny used to say. It seems that some people who have received the AstraZeneca vaccination appear to have developed blood clots, 37 among 17 million people Europeans given the vaccine, so many... Read More
A Royal Family is a projective test: it is designed to be an emblem of a nation with which all citizens can identify. They need to see enough in that family to be able to imagine themselves being part of it. This family, by dint of some historical achievement, is chosen as the prime example... Read More
On Monday England was given an indication as to how it will eventually get out of lockdown. Gradually, and in very careful stages, seems to be the answer. We are in our third lockdown, and have staggered through two false dawns. What is different now is that vaccinations have been completed on 17.7 million citizens... Read More
At a time when there are concerns that Covid is being over-diagnosed, and its impact exaggerated, it is useful to look at another claim: that traumatic events in childhood have a major effect for the rest of a person’s life. On 18 November 1987 a fire at King’s Cross Underground station in London killed 31... Read More
In this part of the world, the first side effect of vaccines has been political. Europe’s nations are now competing to get vaccinated, and the ructions have been considerable. From the start, the UK took a vaccine friendly stance. Early on it decided that vaccination was the long-term solution, and all else was merely a... Read More
A General Practitioner is the English term for what in other countries is called a Family Doctor. She rang us up last week to offer us vaccinations, asking three questions: are you fit and well; have you had a flu vaccination in the last week; have you had allergic reactions to anything? Then we were... Read More
In the continuing story of coronavirus, this week brings two stories about limitations. The first is that production of both Pfizer and AstraZeneca vaccines in Europe is faltering, and from Monday supplies will be reduced for the next few weeks. There have been production problems, of the sort which happen in all manufacturing. It should... Read More
I had always imagined that death had a certainty to it. Taxes are a close second, but death is easier to diagnose. The problem comes when the cause must be written on the certificate. A heavy drinker who falls downstairs has an accidental death, but it was brought on by his habitual drinking. Someone who... Read More
Science and politics make awkward bedfellows. Science is more concerned with the truth, or ought to be; politics more concerned with expediency, survival and the avoidance of blame. For that reason, politics is closer to human nature. It is natural to simply hope for the best, to take precautions a little too late, and relax... Read More
You know the story, but here we go again. The standard account of sex differences in intelligence is that there aren’t any. Or not significant ones, or perhaps some slight ones, but they counter-balance each other. The standard account usually goes on to concede that males are more variable than females, that is to say,... Read More
The UK is under lockdown again. According to YouGov (4340 adults surveyed on 5th January) 85% of citizens approve. There may also be Tiers, of the four former sorts, and a possible fifth for very serious cases, but these have probably been superseded, and should be considered old news. Now it is just lockdown, and... Read More
Despite providing a lot of unsolicited spare time, 2020 was not the best of years. Enough said. Each post got an average of 6000 pageviews, and generated 19,600 comment words, resulting in a total of 530,000 comment words for the year. Since starting in 2013 I have posted 976 items, containing a total of 876,000... Read More
I do not know how many times since 1210 there have been interruptions in the village celebration of Christmas. Few, I would imagine. The present church was built on or near a previous one, and not completed till 1230. There are records a former Lord of the Manor collected and placed in a filing cabinet,... Read More
This has been the year of counting the days. On Saturday morning people in England were preparing for a family Christmas. By 5 pm that afternoon they were phoning their regrets, in sadness and sometimes rage. All this may be good news. Opinions differ. The story so far is that the United Kingdom has not... Read More
James Flynn came to psychology from political science, and was a quick learner. He attacked Arthur Jensen’s 1969 paper, and Art wrote back quickly disposing of his objections, and then suggesting new lines of attack. James Flynn followed those up, and they began working together. I had met Arthur Jensen in 1970, when I gave... Read More
I have excellent memories of Brussels, Belgium, and in particular of the Grande Place, a gem of European architecture, dating back to the 13th century, but in its surviving form mostly the creation of 17th Guilds flaunting their wealth in finely decorated grand trading houses. To stand in it is to savour the refinements of... Read More
With a few weeks to go till the end of 2020 it seems clear that, despite all the other things that have happened, the year will be remembered for the pandemic. Never have so many lives been interrupted for so long. Very roughly, 55 million people across the world die every year. Assume that the... Read More
Many people have very strong beliefs about intelligence testing. All too often those beliefs are negative and unrepresentative of intelligence research. For intelligence researchers, it is a bemusing, irritating, and depressing state of affairs. Steven Pinker, being interviewed at the International Society for Intelligence Research conference in Montreal in 2017, when asked why public understanding... Read More
After a brief summer, in which we dared to hope that we could eventually go to the pub without booking a table, and without choosing our food in advance, the darling buds of May have given way to the surly scowls of September, and we are down in the dumps again. This pandemic is testing... Read More
Without knowing it, I first met Dame Diana Rigg on the afternoon of 23 June 2016, United Kingdom European Union membership referendum day. The day after, I described our meeting thus: In fact, my next meeting with her was also unplanned, in the crockery section of Peter Jones department store, where we talked about the... Read More
The US is unusual in providing racial breakdowns of crime data, including the race of the perpetrators of violent crimes. The US Bureau of Justice Statistics are an excellent source of real data. They do surveys of victimization in the community (National Crime Victimization Survey) which are un-affected by any presumed Police biases, and include... Read More
I don’t usually comment on crime figures, because so many others have done that in full detail before, but my eye was drawn to the BBC News, the major source for most UK citizens, and so well funded by a government levy that it the resources sufficient t have a dominant effect on how British... Read More
You may remember that in 2011 Heiner Rindermann and I worked on the concept of cognitive capitalism, developed that over the next few years, and in 2018 Rindermann published a major book on the topic. Here is a brief interview in which he answers a few questions which generally come up regarding intelligence. Usually, media... Read More
It is perfectly reasonable for critics to ask, every so often, if there is any work showing that genes make a contribution to intellectual differences between genetic groups. I assume it can be accepted that genes make a difference within a genetic group, and the animus arises only when genetic groups are being compared. One... Read More
Tony Elliott was at Keele University, from which I graduated in 1968, the same year he dropped out and founded Time Out, thus becoming by far the most famous and influential graduate of that radical institution, which pioneered a 4 year degree course (not the usual 3) , the entire first year dedicated to a... Read More
No one paper can determine a debate, but each contributes to a pattern, and eventually to a shifting of opinion as to where the probable truth lies. Until 2011 the studies of the genetics of intelligence were based on twin studies, which are fine; and adoption studies, which give some indications if the samples are... Read More
It is a commonplace of school reunions that ex-pupils make a furtive reckoning as to which of them has Done Well. Comparisons are odious, but all too human. How has it gone for you? Naturally, the actuarial odds are against personal success, since success, by definition, must be that which stands out from the crowd,... Read More
If someone tells me I must not read something, I am tempted to give it a look. If you are reading this, you probably have the same curiosity, and the same wish to rebel against other people telling you what you may not read, and what you must not think. In that light, here is... Read More
Few scientists write like that anymore. Science is the poorer for it. Sherrington was able to dash that off when the most complicated device to provide an analogy was a 1801 Jacquard loom capable of weaving complicated patterns on the basis of punched cards. So, Sherrington thought of a loom, Freud of a hydraulic system... Read More
This book, shortly to be published in the US, is written by a geneticist. Racism is a topic of contemporary interest, and there are certainly different conceptions of reality. The book is diminished by its title, which proclaims it an aggressive polemic, looking for a fight. “How to argue about race†would advertise a better... Read More
America is in turmoil because of a video in which a Policeman seems very highly likely to have caused the death of an arrested man. He must face trial. Also, the techniques used in making arrests must be put on trial. Kneeling down on the back of the neck of a hand-cuffed man is not... Read More
Uruguay is a small country on the eastern coast of South America between Argentina and Brazil. Mostly European in demographics, it was long considered the Switzerland of South America because, fearful of the usual local tendency towards dictatorship, it shared power in a plural executive, was early in separating Church and State, in giving votes... Read More
Last night the UK Prime Minister said that those who could not work from home, like those in construction and manufacturing should go to work today, maintaining social distancing, and avoiding public transport if possible. Primary schools may begin reopening in June, as may some shops, and some of the hospitality industry may reopen in... Read More
Europe is an ageing continent, with a total fertility rate of 1.6, well below the required 2.1 replacement level. The decline might be reversed, but the trend is downwards. These 747 million Europeans have a life expectancy of 79 years, and three-quarters of them live in urban settings. Of even more relevance in the time... Read More
There are many ways of making the coronavirus epidemic complicated. It is true that the Chinese account of what happened may be deficient, and that the numbers of deaths are probably underestimated. It is true that as each country received cases from China at somewhat different times and in different numbers it then went through... Read More
A few days ago, there was an updated report on critical care for coronavirus patients in hospitals in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. ICNARC report on COVID-19in critical care 17 April 2020. Sometimes a single table can be illustrative, and this one gives the characteristics of those who end up in critical care. Covid-19 patients... Read More
The predictions which come out of models of epidemics are often highly sensitive to minor changes in assumptions, so can rightly be accused of being wildly wrong when measured against the eventual outcome. “Improve the model†is a common plea. Of course, the most recent model any team publishes is already a presumed improvement on... Read More
It is disturbing that our Prime Minister is in intensive care. The leader of a nation has symbolic as well as instrumental value. It is reasonable for the public to assume that any Prime Minister has good security, good health care, good advice and plenty of material comforts. 10 Downing Street is not that comfortable,... Read More
It seems an age ago that I was singing the praises of Singapore, who had handled the coronavirus in a highly pragmatic way. In brief, citizens were asked to take their own temperatures and if they were above normal, isolate themselves and be tested for coronavirus. Frequent hand washing and the use of masks helped... Read More
It is a bright new day, so here are some thoughts on various subjects, most of which have the same theme: deciding how bad things are depends on your frame of reference. I had said that excess deaths was the key variable in understanding the coronavirus epidemic, and the policies being deployed against it. Once... Read More
While most countries of the world battle against coronavirus, there is a more conceptual battle raging between different predictive models. Imperial College has predictions for the US and the UK, and has the ear of the Government, but there are other models competing for attention. The Imperial model is now being cast as having been... Read More
Arnold Weinstock, a British industrialist, once said “I’ve forgotten what the 7 wonders of the world are, but the 8th must be compound interestâ€. Under his cautious guidance General Electric became a great UK company. Under his successors it went bust. Some problems compound and need to be nipped in the bud. A respect for... Read More
Peering through the window of my study because of an unusual noise in the street last night, I saw three loud men walk by, one of whom saw me at the window, and gave a sardonic half-acknowledgement. Then, shortly afterward three women walked after them. It may not be relevant, but they were all young,... Read More
James Thompson has lectured in Psychology at the University of London all his working life. His first publication and conference presentation was a critique of Jensen’s 1969 paper, with Arthur Jensen in the audience. He also taught Arthur how to use an English public telephone. Many topics have taken up his attention since then, but mostly he comments on intelligence research.
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