There are many traits that would be useful for research and other fields, such as energy, better time management, social ability etc. Intelligence is important for problem-solving in domains where standard rules have not been defined, which might be particularly true in some reasearch. However, it is hard to measure the impact of such ability directly.
David Lubinski and Camilla Persson Benbow, Study of Mathematically
Precocious Youth After 35 Years, Perspectives on Psychological Science, 1,316-343
www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/SMPY/DoingPsychScience2006.pdf
has some intriguing data. They followed up the top percent scorers and compared the uppermost and lowest quartile of this already elite group. Unsurprisingly they were on average doing great, and the top group also earned more and had about six times the rate of tenure at top US universities. But that could just be pure competitive ability rather than any individually or socially useful outcome. The interesting result was that the number of doctorates and percent earning patents was about twice in the top quartile. Doctorates and patents are after all a form of measure of actually having achieved something, and presumably a society is better off if bright people produce more patentable ideas. This IMHO strengthens the idea that we would see gains from cognition enhancement even among the brightest.
However, I think the biggest economic and social impact will be due to intelligence among the great mass of people—reduction of costs and friction due to stupidity, short term thinking, mistakes and other limitations, increased benefits from better cooperation (smart people do better on iterated prisoners dilemma games and have longer time horizons) and ability to manage more complex systems.
A “emotional intelligence enhancer” might be socially beneficial too—there is no reason to think “pure” cognitive function is the end of things we might rationally want to see others enhance.
There are many traits that would be useful for research and other fields, such as energy, better time management, social ability etc. Intelligence is important for problem-solving in domains where standard rules have not been defined, which might be particularly true in some reasearch. However, it is hard to measure the impact of such ability directly.
David Lubinski and Camilla Persson Benbow, Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth After 35 Years, Perspectives on Psychological Science, 1,316-343 www.vanderbilt.edu/Peabody/SMPY/DoingPsychScience2006.pdf has some intriguing data. They followed up the top percent scorers and compared the uppermost and lowest quartile of this already elite group. Unsurprisingly they were on average doing great, and the top group also earned more and had about six times the rate of tenure at top US universities. But that could just be pure competitive ability rather than any individually or socially useful outcome. The interesting result was that the number of doctorates and percent earning patents was about twice in the top quartile. Doctorates and patents are after all a form of measure of actually having achieved something, and presumably a society is better off if bright people produce more patentable ideas. This IMHO strengthens the idea that we would see gains from cognition enhancement even among the brightest.
However, I think the biggest economic and social impact will be due to intelligence among the great mass of people—reduction of costs and friction due to stupidity, short term thinking, mistakes and other limitations, increased benefits from better cooperation (smart people do better on iterated prisoners dilemma games and have longer time horizons) and ability to manage more complex systems.
A “emotional intelligence enhancer” might be socially beneficial too—there is no reason to think “pure” cognitive function is the end of things we might rationally want to see others enhance.