What is the secret of the genius of the Jews? asks the American scholar Charles Murray in an article published in the journal "Commentary" article "Jewish genius". Jews make up only 0.2% of humanity, yet they received 14% of Nobel Prizes in the first half of the 20th century, 29% in the second half, and 32% at the beginning of the 21st century.
From the moment that the IQ test was developed to measure intelligence, it turned out that the Jews have unusually high IQ. The average IQ is 100, but the average Jewish IQ is 110, and the percentage of Jews with an IQ of 140 or more is six times that of other nationalities. In 1954, 28 children with an IQ of 170 and above were found in New York schools, 24 of them were Jews.
Murray rejects the "natural selection" theory, which states that "persecution forced the Jews to hone their intellect in order to survive." Intelligence could not help the Jews survive during the pogroms; on the contrary, the most successful people were the first victims of robbery and violence.
LiveJournal user MosheKam has identified twenty hypotheses that explain the genius of the Jews, which deserve close study
1 Babylonian Eugenics
In 586 BC Jerusalem was completely destroyed by Babylon under the rule of Nebuchadnezzar, who "evicted ... all [Jewish] officers and soldiers, and all carpenters and blacksmiths ... except the poor people of the earth." (2 Samuel 24:10-14).
The Jews of the first Diaspora did well during their exile to Babylon. In his book The Indestructible Jews, Max Dimont states: “In the libraries of Babylon, Jewish intellectuals discovered a whole world of new ideas. For five decades, exiled Jews found themselves at the top of Babylonian society, in business, the world of science and culture. They became leaders in trade, scholars, advisers to rulers."
In 538 BC The Persian king, Cyrus the Great allowed the Jews to return to their homeland. Wealthy Jews who built successful trade routes and businesses in Babylon financed the return-hungry who wanted to rebuild Judah. Initial attempts were unsuccessful, but in the end, 1760 settlers, under the leadership of the prophet Ezra and the ruler Nehemiah, rebuilt the wall of Jerusalem and revived the nation. Returning to Israel, the "Babylonian" Jews found that their poor brothers had lagged behind for half a century and had almost disappeared due to assimilation, dissolution in pagan tribes. Cyril Darlington, in his work The Evolution of Man and Society, suggests that the separation of the Jewish elite and the constant elimination of the uneducated and inept resulted in a genetic intellectual surge.
The returning Jews also established two traditions that would strengthen their minds and cultures in the future - the prohibition of marriages with Gentiles, and the first five books of Moses were canonized into the Torah.
2. An intricate book for the people
The Torah (the first five books of the Hebrew Bible) and the Talmud (the records of the rabbi's arguments) are complex and complex. Practitioners of Judaism need to study voluminous and complex laws. The content of the scriptures is not simple and literal, but rather designed to be understood on many abstract levels. Blind faith and slavish consecration inspired by faith is not for Judaism. Instead, worship in monotheism requires literacy, the cognitive skills to interpret texts. The traditional understanding of the Talmud calls for "studying it seven hours a day for seven years." Charles Murray remarks that "no other religion makes so many claims against the believer", a subsequent analysis shows that "in Judaism to be a good Jew means to be an intelligent Jew".
3. Healthy lifestyle and nutrition
According to their customs, the Jews were more clean than the Gentiles. Celebrates washing hands before every meal, weekly washing for men in the "mikveh" (bathroom for cleansing), and monthly cleansing for women after the end of the menstrual period. The ban on eating pork protected the Jews from trichinosis. Consequently, the Jews were less sick, their bodies suffered less, and this improved their mental faculties.
This point of view is repeated more than once. In 1953, pharmacologist David I. Macht of Johns Hopkins University conducted a study that suggested that dozens of meat dishes in the Jewish diet forbidden by Deuteronomy and Leviticus were in fact very poisonous, according to compared to permitted kosher food. Plus, in Sharon Moalem's latest book, Saving the Sick's Life, there is a suggestion that cutting out all leaven for Passover saved Jews from rats and the spread of bubonic plague in the 13th century. Last but not least, wealthy Jews lived in larger houses than the population of Eastern Europe, which helped them survive epidemics with fewer losses.
4. Emphasis on education
The Torah punishes every Jewish father to teach Torah law to his children, and Marisa Landau on futurepundit.com points out that the Jewish religion forbids leaving children uneducated. Plus, Landau notes that Jewish women also learned to read and write, a phenomenon that was unique in the ancient world. Landau also mentions that the Jews had a tradition of fully providing for a son-in-law for a period of up to 10 years, who wished to devote himself to studies. It seems that it was the Jews who invented something similar to the "stipend".
5. Mandatory Schools for Boys
In the year 64, High Priest Joshua ben Gamla issued and enacted a decree on compulsory schools for all boys, starting from the age of 6. In 100 years the Jews achieved universal male literacy and numeracy, and were the first nation in history to achieve such an achievement.
The progressive edict brought about enormous demographic changes. The high cost of education and the existence of a predominantly farming economy between the 2nd and 6th centuries encouraged many Jews to convert to Christianity, resulting in a decrease in the Jewish population from 4.5 million to 1.2.
Natural "eugenics" favored two groups in this situation: 1) the sons of wealthier, allegedly smarter Jews, who could provide schools and let their sons remain Jews, and 2) the brightest boys, who quickly learned to read, write, and count so on the condition that they could afford to "remain Jewish".
And who got out? Who was excluded from the gene pool? Answer: Poor, uneducated Jews and/or those with the lowest IQs.
6. Expanding cities
80-90% of Jews were farmers in 1 AD. But only 10-20% remained farming by 1000 AD. The requirement for a certain level of education under the decree of Joshua ben Gamla made it possible for Jewish boys to move from the village to the city and learn more skilled professions, including trade and finance.
Moving from the countryside to the cities led to a rapid increase in IQ, thanks to urbanization, the number of educated people increased and technology developed. According to research by Hanoi National University in 2006, the difference between the IQ of students from rural areas and from the city was 19.4. A similar study in Greece in 1970 recorded a difference of 10-13. Other studies note a smaller difference of 2-6, but all agree that city dwellers perform better, and Jews are one of the most urbanized nations in the world.
7. Dialectical and rational thinking
The Jewish approach to learning is "dialectical". The Talmud itself is not just a "code of laws", but on the contrary - a huge collection of ABSTRACTS. Jews are taught to see different aspects of one phenomenon, they learn to formulate questions on any topic, including the Law, the logic of the Rabbi, and faith. The rabbi develops the ability to argue, a whole system of argumentation used by Jews for 2000 years in religious and secular debate.
Dialectic is not a Jewish invention, it is a teaching technique that the Jews borrowed from Greek philosophy, a synthesis of the "Socratic-Jewish methodology." This teaching method was unique in the Middle Ages, compared to the Catholic European "authoritarian" traditions.
Judaism is based on the principles of rational thinking. Analytical, strategic skills are developed in the Jewish dialectical and critical manner of thinking. They are essential for careers in law, science, and engineering.
8. From generation to generation
The main difference between Catholics and Jews is that priests have remained single since the Carthaginian Council in the 4th century and the decree that ordered abstinence from marital relations, while among the Jewish rabbis marriages were always encouraged. During the Middle Ages, the result was a big drop in IQ among Catholics, because their most intelligent and gifted boys were locked up in seminaries, and the gene pool suffered greatly. At the same time, wise, trained Jewish rabbis married smart women and created big smart families.
9. Brain breeding
The Jewish texts constantly emphasize knowledge and intelligence as the highest virtues, and ignorance as the most terrible vice. Following this adage, the Jews amplify their gene pool with resourcefulness. Among the Jews, the most intelligent people have always been valued, they were chosen as husbands, therefore, they generated and spread good genes. In marriages between the children of scientists and successful businessmen, Jews actually combined the ability for abstract thinking and a practical mind.
10. Learning languages
Jewish traders sought buyers for their goods in vast territories, first in Islamic regions, then around the world, selling both rubber in Brazil and silk in China. To flourish trade, they mastered many languages. It was easier to communicate with the tribes in their native languages, which meant fluency in German, Polish, Latvian, Lithuanian, Hungarian, Russian, Ukrainian, French, Danish and other languages.
Today, neuroscientists note that the study of multiple languages enhances memory, mental flexibility, the ability to solve problems, abstract thinking, and the formation of creative hypotheses.
11. Doomed to genius
Jews in Europe were officially excluded from "ordinary" jobs, just as they were forced out of agriculture in 800-1700. BC. In fact, they were usually not allowed to own land. For 900 years, such restrictions forced the Jews into the cities, where they mastered more complex specialties in the field of trade, accounting, finance and investment. The widespread Christian ban on "usury" caused Jews to increasingly engage in finance and banking. According to historical documents, 80% of the Jews in Roussioin, southern France, were usurers in 1270.
Later, when they were evicted from Western Europe, Jews were accepted into Poland as urban investors and movers of trade. They also had great success in middle management positions due to the high demand for mathematical and logical skills in management.
Jews who weren't particularly good at rhetoric and mathematics and weren't successful in white collar positions were forced out of Judaism, meaning low IQs were eliminated. The most successful in trading and accounting, on the contrary, started large families and produced mathematical brains.
12. Scattered by persecution
The smartest and/or wealthiest Jews were more likely to escape the Inquisition, persecution, pogroms, the Holocaust, and other forms of genocide because they: 1) could afford to emigrate; 2) were able to understand that they need it; 3) had social and economic prospects among the nations they fled to. The poorer, with fewer connections, the less intelligent were ruthlessly destroyed.
The repeated exterminations, exiles, flight of Jews are known to all. The first diaspora in Babylon has already been mentioned. Wherever persecution began and whenever it began, Jews were most likely to be saved if they could pay their way or were wealthy enough to have horses, wagons to serve as guards, wealthy relatives who could shelter them, or "high-ranking » friends. High IQ has often been associated with economic well-being.
13. Genetic diseases
Ashkenazi Jews are victims of approximately nineteen debilitating genetic diseases, and it is speculated that some of them may have a cognitive "side effect" that can enhance mental capacity. Many disorders can kill or severely impair those who have two of these genes, but the heirs of only one of them receive a "heterozygous advantage" that stimulates the growth of neurons and strengthens the connection of brain cells.
14. Positive thinking
No one but the Jews works so hard to reach their full potential and positive thinking.
In fact, "positive thinking" raises IQ. Research from Michigan State University in 2011 shows that "mindset" is very important for intelligence, because attitude towards life determines the productivity of reaction to mistakes. The results of this study will be published soon and hopefully along with information for charting IQ achievements.
15. Checkmate
Historically, chess has been the preferred pastime for Jews; in 1905 one magazine called them the "Jewish national game". Almost 50% of grandmasters are Jews. The visual and strategic skills required for this game develop the precuneus in the superior parietal lobe and the caudate nucleus, part of the subcortical ganglion in the subcortex. It must be recognized that these advantages are not inherited, but during the game memory, strategic planning and IQ develop.
16. Melodic thinking
Music has been revered in Jewish tradition for about 3,000 years. Klezmer "achieved a very high level of sophistication and embellishment," according to research by the Jewish Music Institute. Ashkenazi composers and musicians have made enormous contributions to Western classical music. Researchers today believe that music lessons optimize the development of nerve cells and improve brain function in mathematics, analysis, scientific research, memory, creative thinking, stress management, concentration, motivation.
17. Family support
Comfort and support in the family, plus high expectations. Success breeds success on a neurological level. Winning triggers a surge of dopamine, a neurotransmitter that activates motivation for further achievement. Jewish children understand that they can achieve a lot, they are encouraged to develop their skills in order to contribute to the development of mankind.
Is strict discipline necessary to achieve such results? The Jews never approved of physical assault; strong family ties, constant encouragement, great attention to work and excellent education were enough.
Sufficient income is also important, which allows children to receive an education. Prosperity allows you to get into elite educational institutions. Studies show that American Jews earn twice as much as non-Jews and own 2.5 times more real estate. As a result, the average American Jew receives 2.5 times more education. Even during the medieval period, many Jews had a higher and economic status, and in these conditions they had the opportunity to educate their children.
18. Interethnic marriages?
Jews with a lack of intelligence and quick wits were forced out, entering into marriages with other peoples and assimilated there. In the end, only the best remained. This point of view can be traced in other arguments: less intelligent Jews, unable to be their own "priest", inevitably left Judaism for other religions.
19. Sensitive Teacher
Many rabbis were "einsteins of empathy" - amazingly kind, patient, loving and understanding of other people. "Empaths" of such a high level had a great influence in the communities, made their lives better and promoted the right ideas.
20. Fear of anti-Semitism
Jews strive for excellence in science, careers, and wealth because they want to feel safe, protected, and isolated from anti-Semitic sentiment in their environment. Such a view can be justified by the long history of hostility and persecution that the Jews endured.
“Jewish head,” they say all over the world when they want to celebrate someone's ingenuity. “A Yiddish cop,” the Jews themselves nod with some self-satisfaction in such cases. Even anti-Semites do not deny the mental superiority of the nation they hate; moreover, it is in this superiority that they see the most sinister component of the "Jewish threat."
The conventional wisdom about the intellectual power of Jews of European origin - Ashkenazi - is easily confirmed empirically. Everyone knows the predominance, if not the dominance of Jews in areas requiring high mental potential (science, medicine, law, art, business, finance). Jews make up only 2% of the US population, but they account for 27% of the Nobel Prizes awarded to Americans (in other years, the list of Nobel laureates generally looks like a “bare ID”, as they say in Odessa).
It is also known that Ashkenazi Jews, on average, give the highest scores of all ethnic groups and nationalities in IQ tests - 12-15 points above the average value of 100. And the number of owners of a very high IQ (140 points and above ) among Jews is six times higher than the corresponding figure for northern Europeans.
How to explain this indisputable fact? God's choice of the Jewish people? Let us leave theological arguments to learned theologians. There is a much simpler and more logical explanation. The acquisition of knowledge has long been regarded by Jews as the surest way to succeed in life. Scholarship has always and everywhere been surrounded in the Jewish environment with reverent reverence; a distinctive feature of any Jewish community, even the most impoverished, was universal literacy; Jewish parents saw their primary duty in educating their children; on the social scale, a poor Torah scholar stood immeasurably higher than a wealthy merchant who considered it lucky to marry his daughter to the son of a poor rabbi or cantor.
Over the centuries, these traditions of intellectualism have taken firm root in the Jewish mind, giving rise to an irresistible craving for knowledge almost at the level of instinct. But, serious as this argument is, does it exhaust the question? Does it fully explain the Yiddish cop phenomenon? And in general, can we seriously talk about it?
You can, said three scientists from the University of Utah. In an article published in the Journal of Biosocial Science, Greg Cochran and two co-authors concluded that the high level of mental ability of Ashkenazi Jews is an indisputable fact and proposed a physiological explanation for it.
In a condensed form, it is formulated as follows: Jewish intellectualism was the result of Darwinian natural selection, fixed at the genetic level.
In the Middle Ages, the Jews, scattered throughout the countries of Europe, found themselves under the most severe pressure. The law forbade them to own land, carry weapons, they were not accepted into craft guilds. In fact, the only occupations open to Jews were trading and banking. This was facilitated by special circumstances. Religion forbade Christians and Muslims to deal with each other, but Jews were allowed to communicate with both. Because of this, the Jews became natural intermediaries in commercial relations between the two giant religious-geographical blocs.
Christians and Muslims were forbidden to engage in usury. It was not forbidden to lend money to anyone, but to give them at interest - God forbid! However, there was a tricky loophole: the debtor was obliged to cover the losses incurred by the lender due to the lack of loaned money, and the amount of losses was determined by eye by the lender himself. Needless to say, everyone who needed borrowed capital bypassed fellow believers a mile away and poured into Jewish usurers! No matter how disgusting it is to deal with the “enemies of Christ and mankind”, it is much easier to live when you know the exact amount of your debt.
And since credit is the mother's milk of any economic activity, periodic pogroms and expulsions of Jews invariably led to economic chaos, and after a short absence, they involuntarily had to invite the "bloodsuckers" back. At the same time, it should be noted that for all their religious fervor, the pogromists did not forget about their more earthly interests. First of all, the participants in the pogroms rushed to burn the promissory notes of Jewish usurers, and only then did their blood boil at the thought that “these bastards crucified Christ.”
Be that as it may, the Jews, willy-nilly, had to specialize in areas where success depends primarily on mental alertness and business acumen. This is confirmed, in particular, by the data of modern scientific research, which show that in areas such as banking, intelligence (in the form of an IQ coefficient) is highly correlated with earnings.
This fact, as well as the 100% genetic isolation of the Jews (among them there is still a strong prejudice against mixed marriages, and in the Middle Ages there was simply no question of mixing with the surrounding population) served as the starting point for Greg Cochran's research. Historical documents testify that the most successful Jews in business had the most extensive offspring. This is understandable: the children of wealthy parents grew up in more favorable conditions, ate better, had access to more qualified medical care.
The correlation of mental development with business success on the one hand, and business success with fertility on the other hand, gave especially sharp-witted extra chances in the struggle for survival. But is it not possible to assume that there are genes responsible for the mental abilities that the most fortunate people in life pass on to their descendants? Greg Cochran and his co-authors claim that this is the case, and that they have been able to identify genes for intellectual giftedness. It turned out that these are the same genes that are the cause of a number of hereditary diseases that affect only Ashkenazi Jews and no one else.
The fact that small genetically isolated populations are susceptible to hereditary diseases has long been known. Constant interbreeding with relatives, even distant ones, reduces genetic diversity, resulting in the random spread of genes for a number of diseases. However, precisely because of its random nature, this process is devoid of any patterns.
But not in the case of Ashkenazi Jews, Utah scholars say. Of the fifteen genes responsible for the spread of hereditary diseases specific to Ashkenazi Jews, most belong to one of two types: they are either involved in the accumulation of special fats in neurons - sphingolipids that stimulate brain activity, or are involved in DNA repair. Genes of the first type are responsible for neurological diseases such as Tay-Sachs disease, Gaucher syndrome or Niemann-Pick disease. Genes of the second type determine vulnerability to cancer, primarily breast cancer, to which Ashkenazi Jews are statistically more susceptible.
Indeed, it doesn't seem like a coincidence. Especially because in some cases the genes responsible for certain hereditary diseases occur in several varieties, each of which was the result of an independent mutation. In other words, the mutated genes are preserved in the population by the mechanism of natural selection. But isn't this contrary to the very principle of evolution, which protects an organism by ridding it of defective genes through natural selection? Why did evolution suddenly come to the court of genetic diseases? It turns out that there could be very good reasons for this.
West Africans and their descendants are affected by a unique genetic disease called sickle cell anemia, which no longer occurs in any other ethnic group. This disease develops in individuals whose red blood cells contain a special type of hemoglobin, but only when they inherit from both parents copies of the gene responsible for the production of harmful hemoglobin.
Carriers of only a single copy of the defective gene do not develop the disease. But she gives them immunity against malaria - a terrible scourge of the population of tropical Africa. Thus, according to the theory, the selection pressure to keep the sickle cell gene in the population because of its antimalarial properties, balances the selection pressure in favor of the exclusion of this gene from the population to protect it from anemia. Thanks to this balance of power, the gene is preserved in the gene pool, but does not dominate it.
Dr. Cochran and his colleagues believe that something similar happened among Ashkenazi Jews. The genes responsible for the development of mental abilities in a single copy cause pathology in the presence of a double copy. This is indicated by their specific mechanism. All genetic diseases associated with the accumulation of sphingolipids (already mentioned Tay-Sachs disease, Gaucher syndrome, Niemann-Pick disease) are accompanied by overproduction of said lipids.
If this process is excessive, as in carriers of a double copy of the gene, disease is the result. But it may well be that the presence of a single copy also contributes to the overproduction of sphingolipids - not so strong as to have sad consequences, but noticeable enough to give an impetus to brain activity, i.e. enhance mental capacity.
Empirical evidence confirms that this possibility is quite real. For example, persons affected by Gaucher's syndrome, the only one of these diseases that manifests itself in adulthood, have intelligence that is much above average. Among the patients of an Israeli clinic specializing in this disease, the number of people with higher education (engineers, scientists, lawyers, accountants) far exceeds the statistical average.
The work is only in its early stages, but Greg Cochran and his colleagues are convinced that over time they will be able to prove that a single copy of the genes for Tay-Sachs disease, Gaucher syndrome and Niemann-Pick disease increases the IQ coefficient of their carriers by about 5 points. In other words, the Jews do have a stronger intellect, but they have to pay dearly for their mental superiority - genetic diseases.
One cannot help but marvel at the courage of Utah scientists who dared to touch on the issue of intellectual inequality in society - a topic completely tabooed by the canons of political correctness. After all, if we assume that some group is superior to others in one respect or another, it inevitably follows that some other group will be at the opposite pole.
God forbid you, for example, being in a liberal company, marvel aloud at the obvious athletic superiority of Negro athletes - their amazing jumping ability, speed, coordination. The reaction will follow immediately - at best, you will be angrily cut off, and at worst, you will be denounced as a racist and ostracized.
The reason is simple: to allow generalized conclusions about the physical qualities of this or that ethnic group means to give the green light to comparisons and its other properties, and this is fraught with ... M.E. Saltykov-Shchedrin at one time ironically advised officials not to fawn before their superiors, because "admiration for the authorities implies the possibility of not admiring them." But if the classic of Russian literature ordered to “tremble” before the authorities, then the recipe for political correctness is to keep quiet.
In 1994, a fundamental monograph called The Bell Curve was published in America by well-known sociologists Richard Hernstein and Charles Murray. Authors carefully - extremely carefully! - addressed the problem of interracial differences identified in numerous IQ tests. In particular, they noted the fact that African Americans, on average, are inferior to whites in this indicator, which has long been known to specialists.
God, what's going on here! Such pandemonium, such a verbal storm, Washington has probably not seen since the persecution of President Nixon. The walls shook from the frantic howl of the press, which, choking with indignation, vilified the authors as notorious racists. Despite the fact that anyone who took the trouble to get acquainted with the criminal book, it was clear: with few exceptions, none of the hysterical critics bothered to read it. Yes, however, political correctness does not require acquaintance with the object of hatred: it is quite enough to prove oneself “politically literate, ideologically consistent and morally stable,” as they used to say in Soviet times.
Ironically, the story of the sensational book by Hernstein-Murry to some extent confirmed the main thesis of this article. Just before the publication of the monograph, the cunning Jew dodged and died, leaving all the bumps to fall on his Irish co-author. Hernstein proved that he had a “Jewish head” on his shoulders, leaving “Jewish happiness” to his unlucky colleague.
Evgeny Lvovich Ostrovsky (Viktor Volsky)
(1938-2015)
The eminent scholar and writer Charles Murray suggests that the growth of Jewish intelligence was due to the fact that Judaism became a religion in which study and teaching became as important, if not more important, than the observance of religious rituals.
Commentary is one of the most respected and influential monthly magazines in America. It has a relatively small circulation of approximately 32,000, but it is read and revered by the elite circles of American intellectuals. When I receive another copy, I immediately feel guilty: I know that I will not be able to read it "from cover to cover" and will put off the unread "until better times."
But still, I manage to get to the very best articles, and as an example of the seriousness and unusual publications of this magazine, I want to retell you the article "The Jewish Genius" by Charles Murray, an eminent scholar and writer of Irish-Scottish origin from Iowa. In his article, he explores a surprisingly interesting subject: the possible causes of the intellectual superiority of the Jews.
The author subdivides his research into three themes: the timing and nature of the achievements of the Jews; increased IQ (intelligence quotient) among Jews as an explanation for these achievements; current theories about Jews acquiring their heightened IQ.
The most obvious achievements of the Jews are related to religion: they gave rise to monotheism and Christianity, which significantly influenced the development of Western civilization. But until the first millennium of our era, when Greece, China and South Asia were the centers of human intellectual growth, the Jews were not mentioned in the annals relating to philosophy, mathematics, natural sciences or theater.
In his book Human Achievement, Murray compiled a list of "significant personalities" who lived from 1200 to 1800, which included those who were mentioned in at least half of the sources of knowledge corresponding to their field of activity. Among them are only seven Jews, of which the names of only two are widely known: Spinoza and Montaigne.
Such an insignificant presence of Jews among the "significant personalities" in those days is explained by their social and political exile. The emancipation of the Jews began in the 1700s and was largely completed by 1870. This period represents an extraordinary and unique phase of human history.
Between 1830 and 1870, when the first Jews born emancipated reached their forties, 16 Jews appeared on the list of "significant personalities". In the next four decades, by 1910, their number rose to 40. Over the next forty years, from 1910 to 1950, their number almost tripled to 114, despite the wholesale extermination of European Jewry!
Between 1870 and 1950 Jews achieved 4 times more fame in literature, 5 times more in music and visual arts, 6 times more in chemistry, 8 times in biology, 9 times in physics, 12 times in mathematics and 14 times in philosophy in proportion to their numbers. Jews, representing just 0.2% of the world's population, received 14% of Nobel Prizes in the first half of the 20th century, 29% in the 2nd half, and, today, 32% at the start of the 21st century.
Why is this happening? As soon as the first IQ tests appeared, it turned out that the Jews had an unusually high IQ. Of course, the numbers are not completely reliable, but 110 is generally considered to be the average IQ for Jews. Given a standard deviation of 15, it turns out that the percentage of Jews with an IQ of 140 and above is six times higher than among all other nationalities.
For higher IQs, the discrepancy is even greater. In 1954, 28 children with IQs of 170 and above were found in New York schools. 24 of those 28 turned out to be Jews.
Exceptional intelligence does not guarantee outstanding achievement. There are other factors, but intelligence is of course the most determining. A randomly selected Jew is much more likely to be of exceptional intelligence than a randomly selected member of any other ethnic or national group. All of the above is scientific evidence, but there are many disagreements as to how and when the Jews got this increased IQ.
An important factor is genetics. Much less important factors are high income, the presence of books, parental influence. It is known that children adopted or adopted from birth do not reach the IQ of their adoptive parents. There are studies proving that adopted children in Jewish families do not have the high intelligence characteristic of Jews, therefore, the answer must be sought in the Jewish genes.
There are two popular explanations for Jewish "intellectual" genes: 1. natural selection, when only the smartest and strongest of the Jews persecuted for centuries survived; 2. conclusion of marriages according to the principle of preference for mental abilities, when scientists and children of scientists were the most desirable candidates for spouses. The problem with the 1st explanation is that intelligence and strength (rabbinic knowledge and adherence to Judaism) could not possibly be factors of "survival" in the face of mob violence. On the contrary, the most successful and prominent people were certainly the first target of extermination.
The second explanation - marriage according to the principle of preference for mental abilities is also problematic: rich and successful Jews - merchants did not at all seek to give their daughters to poor scientists, whose abilities had no practical value.
In 2006, the largest scientific study of Jewish intelligence showed that high IQ is the prerogative of the Ashkenazi Jews of Northern and Central Europe, and was developed from 800 to about 1600 AD.
The authors of the study concluded that the choice of profession was the main factor in the development of the Jewish intellect. From 800 AD European Jews were allowed to engage only in trade and finance, which required a developed intellect. Non-Jews were mainly engaged in agriculture, where great intellectual abilities were not required. The economic success of the Jews led to lower infant mortality and the development of abilities that were needed in the industries they had taken over. Besides, there were very few mixed marriages at that time, so the genetic code was not "polluted".
Sephardic and Oriental Jews also took up urban occupations. But there is evidence that they concentrated more on craft industries that did not require high intelligence. Thus, they did not develop increased intelligence, modern tests in Israel show that The IQ of non-European Jews is basically equal to the IQ of non-Jews.
Here is a quote from this study: "The proposed selection process explains the stereotype of mental ability in Ashkenazi Jews: with highly developed rhetorical and mathematical abilities, a lack of spatial-visual abilities. Rhetorical and mathematical skills helped medieval businessmen to succeed, while they didn't need spatial-visual abilities."
Murray disagrees with this perfectly acceptable hypothesis: the Jews who remained in the Islamic world showed an extremely high level of achievement at the beginning of the second millennium. They were not Ashkenazi, for whom access to intellectual activity was then closed, they were Sephardim in the Iberian Peninsula, in Baghdad and other Islamic centers. After being expelled in the 1400s, the Sephardim achieved much in the countries where they settled. Some historians believe that the decline of Spain and the rise of the Netherlands are due to the migration of Jews from one country to another. In England, the descendants of the Sephardim also made a great contribution to the development of the country, the best example of which is Benjamin Disraeli.
Murray explains the higher IQ of Ashkenazim compared to Sephardim today by saying that although all Jews everywhere had a higher IQ at the level of about 1000 AD, later on Ashkenazi Jews this level went up, and among Sephardim it decreased. Murray suggests that the growth of Jewish intelligence was due to the fact that Judaism became a religion in which study and teaching became as important, if not more important, than the observance of religious rituals.
He says, and the overwhelming majority of scholars agree with him, that at the beginning of our era, approximately 80-90% of all Jews were employed in agriculture, but by the 11th century this number had dropped to 10-20%. Murray suggests that the migration of Jews from the countryside to the cities was the result of a decree issued in 64 CE. Palestinian sage - Rabbi Yoshua ben Gamla. This decree obligated all male children, starting from the age of 6, to undergo universal education, and was implemented almost rigorously. Therefore, the Jews became the only ones among all the other peoples of the world who received a unique opportunity to master literacy and arithmetic.
Education was a very valuable factor in the urban environment, but of little value in agriculture. For centuries, Jews flocked to the cities to engage in trade.
Between the 1st and 6th centuries CE, the worldwide Jewish population decreased from approximately 4.5 million to 1.5 million. About a million Jews died in Roman uprisings, others were forcibly forced to convert from their faith to another. But, nevertheless, the figures do not come close to three million disappeared Jews. Where did they disappear to?
One acceptable explanation is that the Jews who remained as farmers received no benefit from education and left Judaism. Moreover, with the destruction of the Temple, Judaism became a religion centered on Torah study in decentralized synagogues and prayer houses. Rabbis and Torah teachers became community leaders. All Jewish men, in order to maintain their faith, had to read and understand what they read, not only to themselves, but also aloud, in the presence of others.
They had to be literate, they were required to educate their sons. In short, a good Jew had to be an intellectual. Murray suggests that those who could not cope with Judaism's demands on their intellect left Judaism, while those who remained continued to develop their intellect.
Murray asks if the above means that before the 1st century AD. was the intellectual level of the Jews normal? The Babylonian exile is an additional but historically earlier factor in the growth of the Jewish intellect. We know from the Torah that Nebuchadnezzar "expelled all Jerusalem, and all the princes, and all the brave army - ten thousand were resettled - and all the carpenters and blacksmiths; there was none left but the poor people of the earth" (2 Kings - 24 :fourteen). A century later, when the exiles returned, they found that most of those who remained had converted to other religions. The returned descendants of the elite turned out to be much stronger intellectually than the descendants of those who remained.
In conclusion, I would like to quote two final paragraphs from Charles Murray's study, which I had to cut: "... I stand defenseless before the inevitable question that evolutionary psychologists will ask me: "How exactly this tribe, already in the time of Moses, living in the same environment as all other nomadic and agrarian peoples of the Middle East, could develop a high intelligence, whereas others couldn't?
Here I take the liberty of answering with a hypothesis that no one has yet been able to refute: the Jews are the people chosen by God.
We introduced you to the study of Charles Murray, and what conclusions to draw from it, whether to trust him and to what extent, we leave to you - for that the Jews are an intellectual people.
Why are Jews smart? This question worried other nations at all times. Somehow it was customary to believe that the Jews are smart and rich people. Indeed, among the representatives of this nation it is very rare to meet people of working professions - builders, railway workers, janitors, etc. But there are a lot of Jews whose profession is related to creativity (artists, photographers, poets, writers, designers, singers and producers) or requires a highly developed intellect (scientists, philosophers, chess champions). Yes, even if you just take and look at the statistics of Nobel laureates, then 20% of the prizes were received by representatives of this people, and in completely different industries (both in physics, and in chemistry, and in economics, and in fiction). So why are Jews so smart? in their blood? Are they really the highest nation on our planet? Let's try to figure this out.
One cannot categorically state that the Jews are. After all, all nations are different and representatives of each are good in their own way. African Americans, for example, are excellent basketball players, while Brazilians are simply aces in football. But there are still wonderful and world-famous Americans, Germans, Russians... We all belong to the Homo Sapiens species, and therefore we were all initially given the same start in the development of our mental abilities, regardless of what national roots we have. However, not so long ago, Stephen Walkley of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine conducted studies, the results of which turned out that the nation in question is genetically smarter than the rest. But why are Jews smart? What contributed to this and when? Several different theories answer this question.
1. Religious. Perhaps the heavenly powers chose the Jewish people in order to reward them with all sorts of talents, in particular, outstanding mental abilities. Such an answer would suit very many people who consider themselves, as they say, believers. But we will discuss further.
2. It is no secret to anyone how many troubles, persecutions, persecutions, repressions have fallen to the lot of Jews in their entire history of existence. One of the versions sounds like this: “Why are Jews smart? Because they have a higher IQ just because of the long persecution that forced them to hone their intellect just to survive.” This is believed with even greater difficulty, because if a father has been honing his intellect all his life for the sake of survival, this does not mean at all that he will have a son smarter than himself. Etc. This is nonsense. Yes, and the Jews were considered smart long before they settled in Europe.
3. Writer and scientist Charles Murray answered the question of why Jews are smart in his own way. He believes that the growth of the intellect of this people happened due to the fact that Judaism became such a religion in which teaching and learning became more important factors than the observance of all these religious rituals.
4. The Jews themselves, it turns out, are modest people and never claim that they are the smartest, but they say that they simply try not to be stupid, they lead the righteous, which means that the reward for everything that they achieve is wealth. Moreover, the last for the Jews is a reward given from above, that is, God (“God” and “wealth”, as you can see, and it lies in the family and good relations with people, and not at all in money. So, here are four factors , which, according to the Jews themselves, help them to be smarter:
Upbringing;
habits;
Thinking;
Behavior.
Well, one more question that worries many: why are the Jews rich? The answer is simple - yes, simply because they are smart. That's all. Although no, not all. Wealth in terms of money floats into their hands, since they:
1. Be smart about spending money.
2. They have a normal desire to earn (and not at all fraudulently).
3. Constantly save and invest.
4. Take out insurance in case of illness, force majeure, etc.
5. Moderate in everything.
5. Possess a certain philosophy of life (Jewish).
There is no people in the world more stupid than the Jews. A lot of jokes about the special mind of the Jews roam the Web. All this is nonsense. What makes them think that the Jews are the smartest nation? What makes them think that Jews in general are a smart nation? It just seems to me that the Jews are the most stupid people in the world. There are many smarter than them. At least American blacks. For decades they sang “Let May People Go” - and when they were released, they did not leave anywhere, remained in America and are now slowly taking this fertile country into their hands. They're clever. And the Jews are stupid. For the same decades, they demanded that the Soviet authorities let them go, and as soon as they let them go, they immediately packed up and left - renouncing their rights (as natives) to that land and its forests, subsoil and water, oil, gas, diamonds and gold leaving home, acquired. We arrived in a country without water, without minerals, surrounded by enemies, in a country where the apartment stands like a multi-storey building on their former street. They left the countries and republics in which they lived even before the appearance of the “titular” nation there. We arrived in a country where everyone can reproach: “You weren’t here, what did you come up with?” We left without enlisting a promise from the state, benefited by our departure, to protect our rights to our historical homeland.
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Israeli Arabs are smarter than us; you tell them: if you don’t like Jewish domination, stop obeying us, get freedom, create your own state on the very lands on which you live. No, they are offended: “We are Israelis! Do not dare to excommunicate us from the alma mater ”(Jewish Institute of Social Insurance, popularly called“ Bituach Leumi ”).
Israeli Arabs are smarter - not only will they not separate from us. They will continue to pour dirt on the country and the Jews, they will call us occupiers; most of them do not want to do anything for this country, they are convinced that the Jews should do everything for them. And stupid Jews go out of their way to please them.
6 million Jews died in the Holocaust. If they had survived, there would now be not 12 million, but twice as many Jews in the world. By all logic, corrective discrimination should be applied. Do not allow. The State of Israel does not dare to introduce at least some targeted benefit, allowance, to make up for that loss. Which! If the state gives a shekel to a Jewish family, it must give the same shekel to an Arab family. If he gives a shekel to a Jewish child, he should give shekels to every Arab child. Fair. But is it smart?
The Jews are so stupid, self-righteous, so pompous that they foolishly believe and repeat that they are the smartest, and as a result they receive a demand from everyone else: as the smartest, give way to the unfortunate stupid Arabs a little more!
Try to say that African Americans are the smartest people in the US, you will immediately be accused of racism, in an attempt to abolish corrective discrimination. They are really smart, and they understand that they get a lot from the common pie precisely because they are reputed to be offended.
What proves that Jews are smart? Many Nobel laureates? Yes, the point is not in the mind - the Jews are hardworking, persistent, purposeful, they know that no one will ever give them anything on a plate, from childhood they are ready for fierce competition - and the results are obvious on their chests in the form of a laureate ribbon. There are many nations in the world, numbering huge millions of individuals. Among them there will always be a hundred or two people who could make a Nobel-scale discovery. They just do not make titanic efforts - unlike the Jews. The same answer to the question why there are many talented writers, musicians, and journalists among Jews.
Is there any statistical data that in Israel there is a larger percentage of those who guess the lotto?
Yes, we have developed high-tech - so this is not from a good life; if there was a sea of spilled oil, gas, diamonds, gold, they would also beat the buckets and cut the coupons.
Jews are fools, I am not surprised if I find out that this is the only country in which they continue to pay a pension for years to a person convicted of spying for the worst enemy (Markus Klinberg had several million shekels in his account after his release - the IDF accounting department accurately transferred his pension) . Israel monthly transferred a salary, and then a pension, to an Arab member of the Knesset, who was accused of spying for Hezbollah and fled abroad. Pays a funeral allowance to the family of a terrorist who blew himself up in a crowd of Jews, and then a lifetime allowance to his family, who thus lost their breadwinner. Jews are fools - only they have terrorists who come out of prison with university degrees.
The Turkish president is smart. In the evening, he will bomb Kurdish camps, not making out where the armed militants are, and where women and children are, and in the morning he will declare that Israel is committing war crimes when it fights terrorists. And stupid Jews then apologize to him.
Humanists repeat: you need to be humane, forgive, help the enemy, convince him, act in strict accordance with all international conventions, even when dealing with a brutal killer. And not a single nation, not a single country in the world follows this advice - except for "smart" Jews.
What other people would agree to release a thousand terrorists in exchange for one soldier?
Are blondes the dumbest? Chukchi? Drop it. The most stupid are the Jews.
I foresee everything - crowds of indignant Jews will attack me for insulting the Jewish nation. They need to apologize. I prepare in advance for attacks and I am ready to apologize. I'll just do it like in a famous Jewish joke. Khaim publicly called Abram a fool. He complained to a comrades' court, which ordered the offender to apologize. He should publicly say: “Abram is a smart man. Sorry". You can't change anything in the text, you can't add or subtract a word. Haim did just that. Only he chose the intonation himself: “Abram is a smart person? Sorry".
Are Jews smart? Well then, excuse me.
However, perhaps I'm still wrong. Maybe such behavior, almost scandalous from the point of view of other peoples, is not caused by stupidity. Maybe it's more accurate to call it innocence. Some naivete. Another explanation is also possible.
Sometimes people reach such a level of intelligence that they suddenly open their eyes to many things that are inaccessible to others, and out of higher considerations they stop thinking only about profit, they don’t want to cheat on principle, they want to be honest with themselves first of all, they act according to their conscience, without looking back at those who consider this conscience to be an obsolete concept - even when it harms their selfish interests. And that's why they look like fools in the eyes of others. But this decency will not be exchanged for any momentary benefit.
Maybe it is this “stupid behavior” that is the reason why I feel comfortable in our country. And in general, despite some inevitable costs in every community, I am not ashamed of Israel.
Yuri Moor-Muradov
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