Performance IQ

Posted by Guessedworker on January 10, 2006, 02:51 PM | #

Hardly news, though.  Sixty-five years ago the wartime RAF, particularly Bomber Command, was demanding - and getting - the best possible candidates.  About a third of Bomber Command operational personnel were officers and all were volunteers.  The dull performance post D-Day of the British Army in northern France demonstrated that human potential within a population is finite.  They couldn’t equip themselves with enough quality leadership in the field, either at officer or NCO level.

This is a lesson that our political class has scrupulously avoided learning ever since, in case its beloved egalitarian illusions are punctured.

Posted by Martin Hutchinson on January 10, 2006, 03:39 PM | #

I think the intellectual cream of the British army may have been in Italy in ‘44-45; there was probably a reasonable wish by the authorities not to repeat WW1 and have the elite mashed up in the D-Day landings.  Pretty well all my father’s most intelligent friends who served in WWII were Army Intelligence and in Italy; I had a great uncle in the RAF but he was no Einstein.

Posted by Martin Hutchinson on January 10, 2006, 03:41 PM | #

That’s of course other than the two close friends who were at Bletchley Park inventing the computer (STOP SHOWING OFF, man!)

Posted by Guessedworker on January 10, 2006, 04:08 PM | #

But my Mum was at Bletchley Park!  Not a numbers wizzard, of course.  Probably made the tea.

The RAF in general, and Bomber Command in particular, drew heavily - almost exclusively - upon what hitherto had been the army’s pool of middle-to-high quality recruits.  The top brass and intelligence types were another matter, since they were protected at all costs from the wasteful vicissitudes of facing fighters and flak five hundred miles from home.

Posted by Martin Hutchinson on January 10, 2006, 04:34 PM | #

The two ex Bletchley numbers whizzes were a nightmare when I was a kid, because I was a good child mathematician, so they kept setting me mathematical puzzles, absolutely NONE of which I could solve. Turned out I was really only good at fast mental arithmetic, and was therefore made redundant by the invention of the pocket calculator about 1970 :-(

Posted by Guessedworker on January 10, 2006, 05:06 PM | #

In which case, had you been a generation older you would have found yourself labouring in the orange glow of the Nav’s lamp, with Germany whizzing by twenty-thousand feet below.  Mind you, even those boys had the Dalton computer, so maybe they’d have stuck you in the rear turret.  Do you like halibut oil?

Posted by Metzger on January 10, 2006, 05:36 PM | #

Some may wonder: So what? Can’t someone who scores low on an aptitude test, even very low, go on to become a fine, competent soldier, especially after going through boot camp and training? No question. Some college drop-outs also end up doing very well in business and other professions. But in general, in the military no less than in the civilian world, the norm turns out to be otherwise….

This reasoning is flawed.

One does not necessarily drop out of college solely because of a low IQ.  The college dropouts who end up successful are more than likely ones with—at the very-least—an above average IQ. 

Still, the most interesting aspect of this article is the point that Sailer highlights.  Why do liberals recognize the importance of IQ to the Armed Forces and yet completely deny its importance to, say, affirmative action? 

I’m waiting for the day that one of the countless internal contradictions within egalitarianism causes a liberal’s head to start beeping, emit smoke, and finally explode.

Posted by Melba Peachtoast on January 10, 2006, 06:52 PM | #

From my mother’s sleep I fell into the State,
And I hunched in its belly till my wet fur froze.
Six miles from earth, loosed from the dream of life,
I woke to black flak and the nightmare fighters.
When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose.

Posted by beerman on January 10, 2006, 07:57 PM | #

From my eight cans of Fosters I fell into the state
and I hunched in my armchair and I wet my hose
Six hours later loosed from the dream of life
I awoke to black rage and a hail of blows
When I cried she pulled me the armchair by the nose

Beerfried Sassoon

Posted by Lurker on January 10, 2006, 11:17 PM | #

Metzger - what happens is the liberals head doesnt explode, instead they stop being a liberal, or at least the process of non-liberalism begins. I was that liberal (sort of). However their still-liberal friends will sometimes look at them as if their head had exploded.