r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • 20d ago

Neuroscience Twin study suggests rationality and intelligence share the same genetic roots - the study suggests that being irrational, or making illogical choices, might simply be another way of measuring lower intelligence.

https://www.psypost.org/twin-study-suggests-rationality-and-intelligence-share-the-same-genetic-roots/
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u/Sinai 20d ago

It doesn't take much reading between the lines to see that the author thought the very suggestion of general intelligence and rationality being anything but highly correlated was absurd, and did this study because of that.

“1) We found that irrationality, far from being what IQ tests miss, is one of the best IQ tests available. 2) We found that irrationality, far from being unrelated to genetics and more of a mindset, is among the most heritable of psychological traits. 3) Irrationality is making mistakes which are unnecessary: wrong decisions when we have all the information we need, and some simple logic means there is no reason for the error. We found that realizing what information is available, and applying some simple logic, is almost all of the cause of cognitive irrationality. 4) Cognitive ability explained nearly all of cognitive irrationality, and much of the overlap was genetic.”

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u/AidosKynee 20d ago

I'm always skeptical of solo authors, particularly when the study is inflammatory. Apparently this author is on the editorial board of the journal, which is also a concern.

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u/manimal28 19d ago

particularly when the study is inflammatory

Its inflammatory that irrationality is a trait shared with intelligence?

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u/FlallenGaming 19d ago

I think the reason people find this topic sensitive is because of the historical manner in which ideas like this have been used to justify things like slavery and eugenics. 

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u/manimal28 19d ago

Saying people are unintelligent because of their skin color seems very different to saying that people who are irrational are unintelligent. If people were to attempt to define the concept of intelligence they would probably even use words like rational or logical. It just seems like the concepts are linked by default where a study claiming to verify this should in no way be inflammatory.

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u/MerijnZ1 19d ago

Saying people are unintelligent because of their skin color seems very different to saying that people who are irrational are unintelligent.

Yes, but we also immediately see people in the comments saying all autism should be 'cured', so I do see where some of the connotations are coming from

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u/FlallenGaming 19d ago

I think you are latching on to a secondary critique, which is not the one I was referring to. It's not a far leap to see an argument like this and worry about someone trying to revive eugenics because eugenicists based their claims on arguments from genetics.