Apparently everything I do is an attempt to prove my own elitism :-)

A friend of mine sent me a link to a CNN article about how liberalism, atheism, and sexual exclusivity are linked to IQ.  It seems that many of my opinions are the result of my desire to prove how smart I am.  Oh well, I suppose I'm OK with that.

Though one thing I will say is that sometimes people overestimate the utility of IQ tests.  There's a lot more to a person's intelligence than his ability to do well on an IQ test.  Nevertheless, it was an interesting read, especially because I find evolutionary psychology and biology to be infinitely fascinating. 



A couple of my favorite quotes:

Bailey also said that these preferences may stem from a desire to show superiority or elitism, which also has to do with IQ. In fact, aligning oneself with "unconventional" philosophies such as liberalism or atheism may be "ways to communicate to everyone that you're pretty smart," he said.

and

Religion, the current theory goes, did not help people survive or reproduce necessarily, but goes along the lines of helping people to be paranoid, Kanazawa said. Assuming that, for example, a noise in the distance is a signal of a threat helped early humans to prepare in case of danger.  

"It helps life to be paranoid, and because humans are paranoid, they become more religious, and they see the hands of God everywhere," Kanazawa said. 

Either way, check it out. These types of summaries of research read so much better than the full research articles.  I've been reading a few of the articles in JAMA (The Journal of the American Medical Association), and wow I forgot how dry research prose is!