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Enon's avatar

Good article. It could use more on just how few smart people there are from these countries.

"A country like Somalia with an average IQ of around 70 would produce less than 20k 130 IQ individuals, if even that."

The fraction above an IQ is:

=1 - NORMDIST(IQ; MEAN_IQ; SD)

with the US white mean = 100, s.d = 15, and typically a bit lower s.d. in smaller populations, say 14.

For a 70 IQ country with an s.d. of 14, less than 0.02% (1 in 5650) will have an IQ of 120, less than 0.2% (1 / 500th) of the rate for US whites. (Somalia is probably a bit below 70, 68 would give 1/900 of US White, Nigeria is sbout 70). At 130 / 70, the fraction falls to 9 in 1M. At 130 / 68, 4.7 per million. The population of Somalia is about 20M, so

there are fewer than 100 Somalis with a 130+ IQ.

There are fewer than 43,000 (of 240M) Nigerians with over 120IQ.

Of about 200M US Whites,

there are about 4.5M 130+ IQ,

18M 120+ IQ

Peter Piper's avatar

Great essay, I admire your ability to pull all of it together to form one cohesive argument. It reminds me of Those Who Can See” with a little more fun prose.

I don’t like how modernity is obsessed with the ‘quantifiable’ as the only basis for decision making. Quality can guide decisions too, and used to guide decisions of societies. That’s how societies were differentiated, by the qualities they valued.

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