IQ and autism

There is an interesting video about IQ by Edward Dutton below. Ignore his manic introduction. I have noted his work before. His interest in IQ has, regrettably, made him something of an outcast in academe. Last I heard he was teaching at a university in sub-arctic Finland, which is a long way from his origins in Northern England.

In the video below he presents the Baron-Cohen theory of an association between autism and a very high IQ. He does not define the high IQ group precisely but he includes Mensa members in his coverage so he is apparently discussing people in the top 2% of IQ and perhaps some a bit lower than that. Since I am a former Mensa member and organizer, I am inclined to see him as talking inter alia about me.

And I do fit his major claim about high IQ: That high IQ is associated with autism. I am clearly a high-functioning autistic. I have outlined the evidence for that elsewhere. And many of the things that he says of high IQ people are indeed recognizable in me and by me. So I think there is considerable truth in his generalizations.

There are however some problems with his presentation. The largest problem is that there are a wide range of autistic behaviours, Some people are severely disabled by it and some, like myself, suffer only mild limitations. And not all autistics are highly intelligent, though they do often have some unusual "gift" in some way. My gift is to do even the hardest adademic tasks at lightning speed. I wrote my Ph.D. dissertation in 6 weeks, among other things.

Another problem is of the chicken and egg variety. Does autism cause high IQ or does high IQ cause autism? Dutton seems to think that what makes you highly intelligent also makes you autistic. Maybe -- but there are surely SOME high IQ people who are not autistic. That is obviously a testable proposition but I am not aware of anyone who has tested it

There is some obvious truth in it however. A high IQ person does see the world very differently from Joe Average and that must create social difficulties. And social difficulties are the hallmark of autism. My own social skills are certainly not the best but I have had a rather nice time with the ladies over the years so they cannot be too bad. Many good memories.

So I think Dutton is right in seeing autism as the characteristic ailment of high IQ people but I strongly doubt that all highly intelligent people are autistic. Dutton does tend to overgeneralize.

There is however a research literature in support of his ideas

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnins.2016.00300/full

https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2002-13609-006




*********************************************

Vaccinated English adults under 60 are dying at twice the rate of unvaccinated people the same age

And have been for six months. This chart may seem unbelievable or impossible, but it's correct, based on weekly data from the British government.

Alex Berenson

The brown line represents weekly deaths from all causes of vaccinated people aged 10-59, per 100,000 people.

The blue line represents weekly deaths from all causes of unvaccinated people per 100,000 in the same age range.

I have checked the underlying dataset myself and this graph is correct. Vaccinated people under 60 are twice as likely to die as unvaccinated people. And overall deaths in Britain are running well above normal.

I don’t know how to explain this other than vaccine-caused mortality.

The basic data is available here, download the Excel file and see table 4:

https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/datasets/deathsbyvaccinationstatusengland

https://alexberenson.substack.com/p/vaccinated-english-adults-under-60

**********************************************

It's evidence of white racism when a white teen kills two white men who were attacking him?

Accusations of racism from the Left have long been nothing more than vile abuse, devoid of any real meaning or evidence

Kyle Rittenhouse has said that he supports the Black Lives Matter movement and insisted that his case had nothing to do with race, as protests continue over his acquittal in Kenosha, Wisconsin and elsewhere.

'This case has nothing to do with race. It had nothing to do with race, had to do with the right to self-defense,' Rittenhouse told Fox News host Tucker Carlson in an interview filmed on Sunday.

'I'm not a racist person, I support the BLM movement and peacefully demonstrating,' the teen added in an advance clip of the interview, which is set to air on Monday night.

The teen spoke out as protests continued across the country over the not-guilty verdict, including in Kenosha, where marchers denounced the trial's outcome as racist.

In a partial transcript of the interview provided to DailyMail.com, Rittenhouse also slammed the prosecution in his case, after a jury agreed he acted in justifiable self-defense in acquitting him of all charges.

'I believe there's a lot of prosecutorial misconduct, not just in my case but in other cases,' said Rittenhouse. It's just amazing to see how much a prosecutor can take advantage of someone.'

The case has polarized the nation, with furious accusations from the left that both Rittenhouse and the acquittal are racist, although he and the people who were shot were all white.

*********************************************

America's inflation crisis is even worse than you think

Unless you’ve been living under the world’s biggest rock over the past six months, you know that the United States is experiencing unprecedented inflation.

The consumer price index (CPI), the most popular index measuring inflation, shows the price of consumer products and services jumped 6.2 percent from October 2020 to October 2021 — the fastest 12-month increase in nearly 31 years.

CPI data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics reveal that virtually every aspect of the U.S. economy has been impacted by the inflation. The price of milk has increased 17 percent. Egg prices have risen 42 percent. Energy service prices have increased more than 11 percent.

But as bad as the widely reported CPI inflation figures are, a closer evaluation of key industries reveals that for millions of families, especially those seeking to purchase higher-priced items such as a car or home, inflation is having an even worse impact than the CPI’s topline figures show.

For example, Kelley Blue Book reported in October that the average price of a new car has increased by $5,000 since the end of 2020. A new motor vehicle now costs an average of $45,000 — the highest figure ever recorded.

Even car brands once considered a bargain by consumers have become far too costly for many working families. The average cost of a new Honda in September 2021 was $35,310, and the mean sales price of a car produced by Toyota was $40,778.

Perhaps worst of all is the increase in the cost of new homes. In the fourth quarter of 2019, just prior to the start of the coronavirus pandemic, the average sales price of a home sold in the United States was $384,600. In the third quarter of 2021, the average sales price of a home was $454,300 — nearly $70,000 more.

It’s difficult to understate the historic nature of these figures. The average sales price of a home in the second quarter of 2021 was 17.65 percent higher than it had been 12 months earlier, the third largest year-over-year increase recorded since 1963 and the biggest price jump since 1973, nearly 50 years ago.

Although the day-to-day cost increases of milk, gasoline, eggs, meat and other items are important and are undoubtedly putting a strain on Americans’ wallets, the most important inflationary pressures are occurring in the parts of the economy with higher-priced goods and services.

The inflation crisis is pricing millions of Americans out of the housing market and making it virtually impossible for many families to afford vital items like a car. As a result, key markets are cooling at a time when economic growth is desperately needed. Auto sales, for example, dropped by 7.3 percent from August to September.

It’s vital for consumers to remember that even if inflation soon matches historical norms, the damage that is occurring now will not be reversed without a strong deflationary period, an unlikely outcome that would invite its own set of economic problems.

The reasons for the incredibly high amounts of inflation that have occurred in recent months are not a mystery. Governments’ decision to impose widespread coronavirus lockdowns, coupled with more than a year of government handouts and disincentives to work, created vast supply-chain problems that will take months, if not years, to completely fix.

Further, the decisions made by the Federal Reserve, Congress and the Biden and Trump administrations to print and distribute trillions of dollars over the past year and a half are causing the cost of everything to rise, an outcome that was predictable and avoidable.

Had the Federal Reserve and federal government chosen to target relief to those truly in need during the height of the pandemic, rather than do the financial equivalent of helicopter-drop piles of cash throughout the entire economy, much of the present inflation crisis could have been prevented.

Instead, the Biden administration and Democrats in Congress appear committed to doubling down on this failed approach, an argument best illustrated by Biden’s “Build Back Better” monstrosity.

If passed in its current form, the Build Back Better plan would require the government to spend $1.75 trillion on a slew of government programs and numerous unnecessary handouts, swelling the U.S. budget and requiring hundreds of billions of additional printed dollars, regardless of whether Democrats are successful in achieving their plan to impose jobs-killing tax increases on businesses.

The Biden administration and Democrat-controlled Congress are causing America to slowly but certainly commit economic suicide. The only hope the United States has to reverse course is a widespread, firm backlash against the irresponsible policies that created the present crisis in the first place. A good place to start would be a total rejection of the Build Back Better bill now under consideration in Congress.

https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/581423-americas-inflation-crisis-is-even-worse-than-you-think

************************************

Also see my other blogs. Main ones below:

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

http://antigreen.blogspot.com (GREENIE WATCH)

http://pcwatch.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH)

http://australian-politics.blogspot.com/ (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com/ (TONGUE-TIED)

*************************************