Majorityrights Central > Category: IQ and Heredity

Michael Gove faces the cameras.

Summary: Part two of a roundtable between Guessedworker, DanielS, and Kumiko Oumae, about Brexit and the leadership contest which is emerging in the aftermath of the decision.

Thoughts about the situation in Turkey are again explored.

Recorded on 01 Jul 2016.

Andrew Auernhemer a.k.a. “Weev”

Weev has been a figure associated with WN for several years now and at MR since at least 2010.

I had given him something of the benefit of the doubt as being on our side, since he was on friendly terms with MR prior to my coming here. Weev was well liked by Søren Renner, who, among other gestures of affinity, posted this sad video at Majorityrights, showing Weev explaining his side of the story around the time of his prosecution, just before going to jail for the ATT hack.

Only a few remarks about Weev stand out from what Søren told me, otherwise I had only a general feel of Weev’s place with regard to WN, based on the impromptu “briefing” that Søren gave me about him and then from what limited attention I paid to Weev after Søren departed MR.

Weev emerged from jail and posted photos of himself proudly showing-off his swastika emblazoned chest. I was disgusted with him for that and for his cooperation with The Daily Stormer. I was also disgusted with Søren for his appreciation of Angln’s approach at The Daily Stormer and I wanted to flush out what mutual position the three might occupy. I posted this picture here at MR, Weev with giant swastika tattoo on chest - - it did serve to get Søren to respond: Søren struck me as both hypersensitive in his response on the one hand and impervious on the other, given the fact that I was not exactly exposing anything heretofore a secret. If they think that this is such a sound approach then it seems to me that it could be easily defended by such I.Q. powerhouses. In fact, Søren departed MR and ended contact with me, suggesting that I was taking it too seriously (while maybe he was the one who was being too sensitive).

But anyway, coming back to the few remarks that Søren had made about Weev. Søren said that “Weev is a Jew’ but he’s OK.”

I didn’t carry much weight at MR at that time and didn’t feel it my prerogative to throw any around. I’d say that I went into a sort of denial about it, but really, with Weev in particular going to jail, he wasn’t going to be much harm to us no matter what or how he was.

I liked Søren, quirky, cartoon character sort of guy that he is, and excuses for this remark were swimming only semi-consciously in the back of my head. Maybe he didn’t mean to say that Weev is a literal Jew, but this was Søren’s way of saying that Weev s “a bit of an a-hole, but OK” - an a-hole who is on our side, if not our a-hole.

Or maybe Weev is only a little bit Jewish of his genetic background, but is really on our side. Even at the time I tended to be very skeptical that people who were any part Jewish could be on our side; but again, he was going to jail and therefore of no immanent threat.

Maybe he isn’t Jewish at all and Søren is just showing off his I.Q. snobbery; or that he will make an exception for a Jew if he is a Wittgenstein or a Weev inasmuch as their “genius” is useful for our side. I don’t think these types of Jews will act reliably in our interest, but in this situation, Søren’s predilection seemed good natured, funny and fairly harmless. Even though Søren could have some susceptibility to favor I.Q. over racial distinction, the importance of the distinction from Jews was fairly well buffered - it wasn’t going to easily float past me, anyway. GW thought Weev is a Jew, though I’m not sure how he came to that opinion.

At any rate, Søren’s participation at Majorityrights decreased during the time of Weev’s incarceration. I was a bit sour on him for his appreciation of The Daily Stormer angle but he was more than welcome by me to post and otherwise participate. I had been and have been busily trying to build up an alternative platform from the standard right-wing, “Hitler and Jesus are us, Jews are White like us too, and should be included if they want.”  I am serious about this platform not taking on that nonsense. So, when Søren suddenly reappeared with a few gratuitously disagreeable remarks and this silly post, I decided to make a post calling to account those popular WN figures - Duke, Anglin and Weev apparently looking to redeem Hitler.

As he hadn’t in years, Søren came on to Skype to chat with me, saying that I was too backward looking, that I was taking it too seriously and that I shouldn’t have brought Weev into it; then he removed me from his Skype contacts and that was the last I heard from him.

OK, before too long Weev re-emerges in the right-wing after coming out of jail, now with a Swastika on his chest and as a big hero of the The Daily Stormer et al., presumably. I didn’t pay much attention to him at The Daily Stormer since that tent of the alternative right-wing tentosphere is fairly circumscribed, buffered buffoonery. However, I started to catch wind of Weev making the rounds of the tentosphere.

With Weev at a safe distance now and making rounds on common subject matter, it was worth a listen to some of what he might have to say at this point. Since he is from Arkansas and has experienced blacks, it is quite reasonable to believe, in accordance with all indications, that Weev is sincere in his dislike of them - he has some sincere common interest with WN. Hell, if he is acting, he does a good job of it and of articulating grievances with Jews too.

But any man who causes the name of a website called “Gay Ni****s of America” to appear on the front page of the website of US presidential candidate (and US president to be) Barack Obama, cannot be all bad. lolllzzzzllllolllzzzzzz indeed.

  On February 11, 2007, an attack was launched on the website of US presidential candidate (and future US president) Barack Obama, where the group’s name was caused to appear on the website’s front page.

As another one coming to Dana Anthiochus’ leaky border between White and non-White interests, Weev came to talk with Dana on 25 September 2015 about computer technology, his concerned advice on race and state-of-the-art warfare.

I insisted that Kumiko have a listen with me, and render a critique, as these concerns bear upon her expertise. We developed an outline which I will post below. A Weev article has been long on the back-burner, but has become relevant now with Dennis Fetcho’s experience and criticism, if not exposure of Weev.

Though a right-winger himself, Dennis Fetcho has some interesting things to say.

He did a podcast of his own and one with Nick Spero recently to discuss Weev. Fetcho finds Weev’s covering stories risible - Weev being a Christian identitarian concerned with White interests and so on. “Christian Identiy?’, Fetcho says, “before he was a Mormon, he doesn’t know what he is.” But of the fact that that Weev is Jewish and that he was always on “the enemy side” Fetcho is confident. Weev apparently made Fetcho’s life hell, attacking and damaging his websites as he apparently would do any site that was “anti-Semitic.”

Fetcho maintains further, that Weev was not prosecuted by the U.S. Government singularly for hacking A.T.T. as he maintains, but because he was a nuisance who had done the same thing to many people, hacking and trolling them relentlessly as a part of a team that caused many innocent people significant problems.

Now we have Weev’s triumphant return to White Nationalism, with him presenting himself as a cult hero if not integral to their right-wing sites and aspirations. He is treated like a “hero” at The Daily Stormer and other alternative right sites for his recent print station hacking stunt - at least he claims it as his handiwork; Fetcho doesn’t believe that he acted alone to cause the printers at some American universities and some in China to print-out a poster with an anti-Jewish statement, and declaring world wide “White supremacism” with two large swastikas on each side of the text. Fetcho makes the point that this is barely newsworthy. I concur and did not run the story at MR and would not have if not for the implications of Weev’s detrimental involvement with WN.

           
    Weev, “I chose the swastika image because it is a symbol universally recognizable to all printers.”

What good does it do to create a “problem” of printing out anti-Semitic posters with Swastikas, proclaiming global White supremacism into print stations at the heavily Jewish American universities and in China?

It is perfect public relations - for the ADL.

Universities are not known for their skin head types, nor are book worms likely to be roused to enact global Nazism. The universities are replete rather with empowered Jewish folks, who can proclaim that they have a growing problem with anti-Semitism, need to clamp-down and need more assistance from the State.

This kind of vainglory printing-out in China works against projects like MR’s, to build regional alliance between Asia and Europe.

My reaction from the onset would suffice without any elaborate conspiracy. Our eminently noble cause of White sovereignty is only harmed by association with Nazism and “supremacism.” It will only harm Whites, set us against each other and turn-off normal Whites, needless to say how non-Whites would react.

No White advocates were talking in terms of “White supremacism” until Weev brought it back in his talk with Dana Antiochus.

No concerned White advocates subscribe to White supremacism because it is at odds with the separatism to which we aspire - attempting to dominate others is at odds with separatism. In trying to resurrect this concept of “White supremacism” Weev is attempting to brand us with a term as surely as he has branded himself with a corny tattoo as if to brand and represent us with it. He would libel us by associating our cause with the term that Jewish groups have been trying to smear White advocates with for decades - despite the fact that nobody, except for Weev now, promotes the term.

It does no good to Whites, but it does however, serve the interests of the ADL. It divides Whites, turns off normal Whites to our cause, creates the notion that Jews need more state protection on their side, etc.

Coming back to Dana Antiochus’ 25 Sep 2015 talk: Weev pushed the envelope of violence, declared world wide “White supremacism” the way forward and the intimidating idea that drone warfare would make the normal means of fighting for your people obsolete.

My initial impression that this was just a right-winger giving the right-wingers at Renegade what they want - a new Swastika tattoo, some Jew, Jew, Jew, unanimity with Uncle Adolf and you’re good to go.

With Fetcho’s intervention, however, Auernheimer looks more like a provocateur than the friendly rogue, Weev.

Andrew Auernheimer, a.k.a., “Weev”, the suspicious friend of The Daily Stormer and TRS, just so happens to be their Johnny on the spot when their sites have problems.

Fetcho claims that Weev does have some Jewish background, which we (GW and I, DanielS) have reason to suspect as well.

Fetcho maintains that the US government didn’t go after Weev for the singular hacking of ATT accounts incident as he claimed, but rather because he was hacking and harassing innocent people all over the place, including Fetcho relentlessly.

Fetcho renders plausible arguments against Weev’s “great hack” of the printer stations at several universities, and apparently in China as well. He asks first, whether he really did this this by himself? Then takes the premise to what follows by saying that this is not a newsworthy story on its face value (I agree, and had not run it at MR). It accomplishes little of positive value, but does create a “problem” for the Jewish laden universities that requires them to provide a “solution” of clamping down on hate speech. This is an attendant benefit to our enemies by associating WN with Nazism and “supremacism.”

And that is the large point that I believe Fetcho has got very right - there is a close approximation of Zero White advocates who have been claiming “White supremacism” and yet what Auernheimer has been doing re-vitalizes the Jewish smear line of “White supremacism” along with the Nazi association in order to discredit WN and turn people off.

Moreover, what sincere White Nationalist would hack Chinese printers to announce “global White supremacism” ? Most probably none.

But a Jewish sponsored troll, trying to prevent Chinese and White cooperation just might.

Who is served by associating “White Nationalism” with The Daily Stormer, Nazism and “Supremacism” ?  Jewish groups are served.

Here is the Nick Spero “Circus Maximus” show in which Weev is discussed in the third hour: The first two hours are Lee Rogers, the third hour Dennis Fetcho. Lee Rogers is your standard anti-Jewish right-winger, not much new but no harm if you can ignore his “holohoax” line and his falling on the AH side of the false either/or; moving to hour three, Dennis Fetcho has interesting things to say about Weev.

Again, Fetcho is a right-winger, with those foibles, including the pro-reich, “it was all a holohoax”, 9-11 and all that usual boring right-wing stuff, but the things he is saying about Weev gather sense.

He talks about Weev on his own show as well:

Apr. 2, 2016

  Hour 1
  Garbage World of Hackers

  Hour 2
  Weev and ADL Crafted Messages

Beware of the right-wing: they are full of fools and foolers.

On black hat hacking at red ice.

Weev on identifying companies with unknown liabilities

Weev tells his side of the story to RT

Weev on why he trolls

Weev on the difference between trolling and hacking

Here is an outline of Kumiko’s initial take on Weev’s discussion - with Antiochus, 25 September 2015 - on computer tech, race and state-of-the-art warfare. Since these topics square with her expertise on all counts and with our concerns on all counts, her opinion is quite relevant. This is just an outlne that I took down as dictation from what we gathered at the time (last September).

Weev on the players and the technological transformation of war: “it will be massively a-symmetric and robotic.”

1. Showing ATT its vulnerabilities was a good turn; but revealing the data to (((Gawker))) was tactless.

2 Don’t talk to the police! Weev should not have talked to the police.

3. “Black hat” is the wrong term to self ascribe, it underscores an unduly negative angle that adversaries would attribute to Weev - he should not cop to that, but rather identify as a “Gray hat.”

4. Should not say German patriots are setting fire to refugee camps or that he wants to kill blacks just because they are black.

5. His idea of robotic and drone war is problematic - it does Not render traditional forces obsolete. In certain circumstances you want troops in there in certain circumstances you don’t.

For another significant point of criticism, there are more ways to counter robot and drone technology than Weev is taking into account.

Kumiko has other assessments and critiques of his politics and computer abilities: where he is mistaken, where he could do better.

6. Very important: you still need popular sentiment on your side. It is not enough, especially not nowadays, to think in terms of warfare being so asymmetrical that just one percent or a small percent can fight and win.

7. His view on Christianity, newly reconsidered as it may be, could be reasonable enough: reminiscent of Bohrmann.

8. He is correct that it should not be a false either/or between universalistic Christianity, Jews and Islam. They are all beyond the pale.

9. His association with Anglin and other right wingers is dubious. NS Germany was leftist at its inspiration, onset and groundswell.

10. Assad never offered nor had any intention of stepping down. Russia made a duplicitous offer to take Assad down in exchange for keeping its port but The US decided to try to take him down themselves. The results were still bad but the motives were different than Weev made it out to be.

Regarding Auernheimer’s assessment of the inexorable link between Isis, Israel, The US - the deal with Iran indicates that business interests and geopolitics can override Israeli interests

11. He overstates the exclusivity of White accomplishment in computer technology.

12. His troll of Obama’s website with “Gay n*****s of America” was very funny.

Controversy ahead.

Summary: This interview was with Tomislav Sunic about the migration problem in Europe. Kumiko Oumae was hosting, standing in for Guessedworker, along with DanielS as co-host.

The issues which we covered were:

• The idea that part of the reason for the migration wave is psychological rather than strictly structural.
• Discussion on whether the words ‘migration’ or ‘crisis’ were really appropriate descriptions of what is happening.
• Discussion of weaknesses of Christianity in the face of an enemy.
• The relationship between countries in South Eastern Europe.
• Cases of religion being used as a cultural-historical identification rather than as a belief system.
• The influx of migrants and the terrorist threat posed by them to the European Union.
• The advantages which the defenders have over the invaders, given the disparity in average IQ.
• ‘Better is worse’, and how a deteriorating security situation can be a catalyst for total structural change in the case where all else fails.

I think it was a fantastic interview, I was really honoured to have Tomislav Sunic on our show, and I hope to have him back again as soon as possible. He’s really one of the best ethno-nationalist speakers alive.

Tom Sunic

Below is my response to “A New Chapter in the Fascist Internationale” by Alexander Reid Ross, in Counterpunch, September 16, 2015.

Mr. Alexander Reid Ross, Counterpunch

Dear Mr. Ross:

I read with great interest your article, “A New Chapter in the Fascist Internationale,” published in Counterpunch and must commend you on your polished syntax and a good, albeit somewhat hasty summary of what is awkwardly termed the “World National-Conservative Movement.”  As a long time reader and admirer of some Counterpunch authors who dispel the myth of progress and who tackle the liberal mystique of permanent economic growth, it is quite possible that we have more in common than what may appear in my critical remarks. Having ties with many so-called “White nationalists” in all parts of the world, and being also a Director of the American Freedom Party, let me try to put things into a short conceptual and linguistic perspective first.

The words ‘Fascism’ and ‘Nazism’ are constantly used as weapons to vilify people who identify as White and have a sense of White interests, to the point that these words have now become meaningless. Both have been so much subject to semantic distortions over the last 70 years, to the point that there is no longer any meaningful relationship between current movements labeled with those terms and the cultural-political movements in the Europe of the early twentieth century.  (I am sure Noam Chomsky would partly agree with that).  Instead, the term ‘Fascism’ is tossed around today as a generic locution in order to criminalize and pathologize any non-conformist White person or any group of White people by implying that they are nothing more than xenophobic haters.

Hence, if we look at Fascism or National Socialism through such demonological glasses, we run the risk of landing in the realms of the ancient Greek underworld, more worthy of the Hesiod’s and Homer’s prose and certainly not into a dispassionate Elysian field of objective historical narrative. I am probably acutely (and sadly) aware of the “antifascist meta-language,” having grown up in what was known as communist Yugoslavia. Back then “Fascist beasts,”  “Croat Fascist monsters,” “Nazi terrorists,”  were a central part of the Communist Party vernacular, and any non-conformist thinker was routinely and permanently consigned to this home-grown bestiary.  Alas, what I am witnessing now in the USA and EU media, as well as in higher education, is a recapitulation of these paleo-communist memes, albeit dressed up in more attractive attire and blessed with the legitimacy that only the elite media can confer.

I hope you have read some of the authors mentioned in your article. Otherwise, again, one runs the risk of entangling oneself in the dialogue of the deaf.  Apart from books by “mainstream” scholars such as Zeev Sternhell and Ernst Nolte, it is very difficult to find any other contemporary authors who more or less objectively document the intellectual origins of Fascism or Nationalism Socialism. Rather than describing the very real problems confronting these societies or attempting an honest appraisal of the popular appeal and economic achievements of these cultures, we see little more than gratuitous moralizing while at the same time the monstrous police states and mass murder perpetrated by the Left* during the same period are ignored.  Without wishing to sound pretentious with my own intellectual baggage, there is no way one can fully grasp the birth of the “conservative revolution,” or Fascism, or National Socialism without being fully proficient in the German and the French languages and knowing very well the cultural heritage of Europe prior to 1922 and 1933.

The fears and concerns motivating the current increase in what you would call fascist parties stem from the tidal waves of non-European immigration that are affecting almost all European countries. These fears and concerns are quite different than those that gave rise to fascism in the 1920s and 1930s, and they are quite legitimate. The attitude of the left* is that people are essentially interchangeable, so that it makes no difference who immigrates to the US or Europe, and the native Whites of those areas have no legitimate interests in preserving their political, demographic and cultural dominance. This is simply not the case.

The immigration issue is critical. The US is projected to be majority non-White in just a few years, and even European countries like the UK that have had relatively homogeneous populations deriving from what is a relatively homogeneous European gene pool for thousands of years are projected to be majority non-White within the century. The ongoing crisis centered most glaringly in Germany promises to speed the day when native Germans, whose ancestors have dominated Central Europe for well over 1000 years will become a minority.

The view that immigrants are interchangeable ignores the costs of multiculturalism in terms of increased conflict, lack of willingness to contribute to public goods like health care, and social cohesion. Thus it’s one thing for the US to have immigrants from various parts of Europe; they have assimilated very well. It’s quite another thing to have immigrants from the Middle East and Africa with very different cultures and very different psychological traits (including IQ levels), and strong tendencies not to assimilate.
                                           
This view also ignores the long history of ethnic conflict in multi-ethnic, multicultural societies. The idea that societies where Whites become a minority will live in peace and harmony is Utopian to say the least, especially given the fact that Whites are now being blamed for all the problems of non-White groups, including the educational failures of Blacks and other immigrant groups (an argument that ignores the success of East Asians in Western societies). The hostility toward Whites with their history of colonialism and expansion will not end when Whites become a minority. It is a very real fear among a great many Whites that these changes are absolutely not in their long-term interests. It is quite reasonable and makes the appeal of populist politicians like Donald Trump in the US understandable.

On the personal level, yes, I must admit, I feel more at ease talking to working class Americans when visiting a village in the Ozarks, or being a guest of honor at a simple farmer’s house in the German Harz. One finds that the common sense and political judgment of these people often surpass those of many modern scholars focused solely on demonizing movements they do not understand and promoting utopian projects that ignore human nature in favor of creating multicultural societies that are not only prone to ethnic conflict, but violate the legitimate interests of Whites who have dominated these areas for hundreds or, in the case Europe, thousands of years.

Regardless of our possible disagreements and despite the fact that you will likely dismiss me by simply classifying me as a “White supremacist” or “White nationalist” or whatever, I must point out the following: The ongoing balkanization of the USA (where voting patterns increasingly reflect racial divides) bears remarkable similarity to what occurred in the former Yugoslavia shortly before it broke down in 1991. The current EU and the floods of non-European immigrants in Europe — and yes, at this very moment there is a quasi-state of emergency resulting from the migrants/invaders swamping my native Croatia — do not bode well for a starry-eyed project of multiracial and ecumenical conviviality. When the proverbial push comes to shove, one no longer needs to study diverse Levantine or African haplotypes or immerse oneself in the books of cultural pessimists. One must then be ready to weather the storm either by voting for Donald Trump or the American Freedom Party’s Bob Whitaker, or whoever is willing to salvage one’s heritage. I am sure that in a case of emergency you will also figure out which side of the fence it is better to sit on.

Best wishes,

Tom Sunic, PhD
www.tomsunic.com
http://american3rdposition.com/

* Editor’s note: Sunic is talking about the Red Left here, and its liberal prescriptions for Whites. He is Not talking about the White Left

.......................................................
Tramp steamers leaving for Italy from Libya. Photos courtesy Louis Beam

       

A couple of days ago I happened across a PDF of Murray’s 2003 opus, Human Accomplishment: The Pursuit of Excellence in the Arts and Sciences, 800 B.C. To 1950.  Some may view it as an unwieldy attempt to produce an objective analysis from deeply subjective values and tastes.  But it is also a beautifully written account of the unsurpassed creativity of the European Mind, and an eloquent retort to those who bandy around notions of human equality above the neck.

The PDF is here.

https://www.gwern.net/docs/2003-murray-human-accomplishment.pdf

There cannot be many of us who do not owe a debt of gratitude to Phil Rushton, both for his theoretical brilliance, allied to an unswerving devotion in most difficult professional circumstances to the cause of unpopular scientific truths, and for his steadfast, loyal European heart.  How much poorer would we all have been had Rushton not possessed these qualities ... had he merely shied away from the race question and lived an ordinary academic’s life, a quiet life, the life of an unquestioning product of his political times.

I did not discover Rushton until early in 2003.  It was at that time when I had decided to contribute something to the cause of white survival.  There was a particular question which troubled me, and which I saw as holding a key to changing the fortunes of white advocacy.  To answer it I needed a crucible, and to get that ... to construct something people would feel worthwhile writing for and reading ... I had to generate some kind of internet presence.

Cue Race, Evolution, and Behaviour.  When I came across it at Rushton’s own Darwin site, it had already been published eight years, and Rushton himself had said that he had run out of opponents to debate.  I certainly hadn’t, though.  I had found what I needed, and promptly devoured it in one sitting, reading in bed until the small hours.  For the next fourteen or fifteen months I blasted around the political blogosphere provoking every liberal, every racial egalitarian, every race-denier, every anti-racist I could into a hopeless battle about human differences and hereditarianism (hopeless courtesy of Rushton’s superb analysis), psychometrics, and gene issues generally.

A surprising number of my opponents knew of Rushton, and had a ready put-down - second- or third-hand of course.  I do not believe that a single one of them escaped the shredder.  REB’s central theory of r/K and child development was just too perfect in its internal fit.  Most of the liberal rif-raff, of course, didn’t know about this “controversial” (meaning courageous) Anglo-Canadian psychology professor, born on the Dorset-Hampshire border a couple of miles from my own birthplace and eight years distant in time.  They would, in any case, have considered their political truths inviolable to attack by one supposed racist using the theories of another.  They never had a chance.  There was metaphorical blood everywhere.

Thanks to the carnage I had something to gesture towards when the moment came, in the summer of 2004, to put together a slate of writers for a website to be titled majorityrights.com.  I never knew Rushton, and only corresponded with him very briefly.  I wish now I had had the opportunity to explain how much I extracted from his thesis and to what purpose I had put it.  He would probably have wanted to know, like most scientists, if I had correctly and faithfully represented his thought.  The answer was that REB was so beautifully and clearly written, that was an easy task.

There is not another Phil Rushton in this world.  White Nationalism has lost a true champion.  He did not live nearly long enough - gone at just 68.  But for his life and his talents and his work we equally loyal-hearted sons and daughters of old Europe can be extraordinarily grateful.  I know I am.

Two arguments about the maths gap, spotted by John Ray - the first from World Science:-

It’s been a long, sometimes vicious controversy: are boys better at math than girls? Some say they are, because boys tend to outscore girls in math. Opponents blame that on sexist upbringing. 

New studies may be shedding light on the issue. In a nutshell, some of the latest research points to three conclusions that offer something to satisfy both sides but overall paint a bright picture for those eager to see more women enter mathematics and sciences. The key findings: Girls are as good at math as boys given the proper environment.

Males may have an edge in spatial thinking abilities, which are useful in math, evolutionarily speaking, and this advantage may be very ancient.

Deep-rooted though this difference may be, females can surmount it with just a little work.  “The so-called gender gap in math skills seems to be at least partially correlated to environmental factors,” said Paola Sapienza of The Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University in Illinois. “The gap doesn’t exist in countries in which men and women have access to similar resources and opportunities,” added Sapienza, summarizing the results of a new study published in the May 30 issue of the research journal Science.

In it, Sapienza and colleagues analyzed data from more than 276,000 children in 40 countries who took an internationally standardized test of math, reading, science and problem-solving. The data came from the 2003 Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development Programme for International Student Assessment.

The researchers found that globally, boys outperformed girls in math by 10.5 points on average on this test. But this advantage vanished in some of the most progressive and gender-equal countries such as Iceland, Sweden and Norway.

Now that the apparent good news is out, does this mean anyone who dared suggest the existence of natural gender differences in math was being sexist?

Not necessarily, if one believes other studies suggesting sexism isn’t the only reason for the math gap. Some research has attributed that gap to a deeper discrepancy in spatial reasoning abilities. One new study even suggests an evolutionary reason: better spatial reasoning in males might be related to larger range size in their ancestral environment.

This discrepancy may extend all the way down the evolutionary tree to invertebrates, according to the research, which focused on cuttlefish and appears in the May 27 online issue of the research journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

“Evidence of sex differences in spatial cognition have been reported in a wide range of vertebrate species,” but never the simpler invetebrates, the authors wrote. The investigators found that male cuttlefish both range over a larger area, and have better orienting abilities than female cuttlefish. “The data conform to the predictions of the range size hypothesis,” they wrote.

Nevertheless, differences in spatial cognition are easily surmountable, if one believes yet a third study, which might help explain why ultimately girls and boys can perform equally in math. Published in last October’s issue of the journal Psychological Science, this study found that malefemale differences in some tasks requiring spatial skills are largely eliminated after both groups play a video game for 10 hours.

“On average, women are not quite as good at rapidly switching attention among different objects and this may be one reason why women do not do as well on spatial tasks,” said the lead author, University of Toronto psychology doctoral student Jing Feng. But “both men and women can improve their spatial skills by playing a video game,” he added, and “the women catch up to the men. Moreover, the improved performance of both sexes was maintained when we assessed them again after five months.”  The game used was a first-person shootemup game, “Medal of Honor: Pacific Assault.”

The game “may cause the expression of previously inactive genes which control the development of neural [brain] connections that are necessary for spatial attention,” said Ian Spence, director of the university’s engineering psychology laboratory. “Clearly, something dramatic is happening in the brain” thanks to the playing.

“One important application of this research could be in helping to attract more women to the mathematical sciences and engineering,” he added. “Since spatial skills play an important role in these professions, bringing the spatial skills of young women up to the level of their male counterparts could help to change the gender balance in these fields that are so important to our economic health.”

And now for the demolition:-

READ MORE...