Christopher, I was surprised by the lack of backlash to this post; I expected much more. In fact, I really don’t understand why the Jaynes post got backlash and this one didn’t. Maybe all the people I warned not to read it, really didn’t. So maybe this was all known to everyone except me.
The men at the power-elite gathering were also noticeably taller than average, so unless that actually correlates to intelligence, there are forces besides pure competence at work.
so unless [height] actually correlates to intelligence
It does. Possibly due to larger brain size and possibly due to better nutrition. Of course, the cause could go both ways: you could be seeing higher intelligence because taller people are viewed as better leaders, and intelligence correlates with height. In reality, the situation is probably more complex than that, and the actual causes of success (as opposed to the correlates) are not well established.
Christopher, I was surprised by the lack of backlash to this post; I expected much more. In fact, I really don’t understand why the Jaynes post got backlash and this one didn’t. Maybe all the people I warned not to read it, really didn’t. So maybe this was all known to everyone except me.
The men at the power-elite gathering were also noticeably taller than average, so unless that actually correlates to intelligence, there are forces besides pure competence at work.
It does. Possibly due to larger brain size and possibly due to better nutrition. Of course, the cause could go both ways: you could be seeing higher intelligence because taller people are viewed as better leaders, and intelligence correlates with height. In reality, the situation is probably more complex than that, and the actual causes of success (as opposed to the correlates) are not well established.
Wikipedia also has an article about that.
But given that the correlation is only 0.2, Eliezer’s probably right that there are other advantages.