this post was submitted on 15 Apr 2026
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A study conducted in Germany found that men with higher IQs are less inclined to traditional values, but the lead author, psychologist and intelligence researcher Maximilian Krolo of Saarland University, said the researchers did not find these differences among women.

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[–] Azrael@reddthat.com 29 points 5 days ago (1 children)

"The current study showed that high intelligence does not, as one might assume, lead to radical political positions. Instead, highly gifted adults are on average just as politically diverse and moderate as the rest of the population."

Well that headline is...misleading.

[–] forkDestroyer 6 points 5 days ago (1 children)

Imagining a world where the headlines aren't click bait and the articles are well researched. One day...

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 points 5 days ago

You'd need media that wasn't predicated on advertising revenues.

[–] UnrepententProcrastinator@lemmy.ca 70 points 6 days ago (8 children)

Aaah a feel-good article for leftists.

Plenty of dumb dumbs among us, don't worry.

[–] AnalogHole@lemmy.blahaj.zone 28 points 6 days ago (7 children)

There's a reason universities lean heavily left

[–] UnrepententProcrastinator@lemmy.ca 13 points 6 days ago (3 children)

I would disagree on the "heavily" unless you accept the US definition of the right-left paradigm.

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[–] BarneyPiccolo@lemmy.today 58 points 6 days ago

Higher IQ is also associated with higher Critical Thinking Skills, which help you recognize and avoid conservative propaganda.

[–] Vespair@lemmy.zip 13 points 5 days ago (1 children)

"Solid ice colder than liquid water, study finds."

[–] partofthevoice@lemmy.zip 3 points 5 days ago

Proof that academia cultures the left, neglecting real science like the fact that you can pressurize water into ice while preserving its warmth!

~ a conservative somewhere

[–] Sisyphe@lemmy.world 49 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago)

Here's a link to the paper, so you don't have to read an article about an article.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160289625000893

[–] osanna@lemmy.vg 60 points 6 days ago (2 children)

Of course. There's a reason why conservatives don't want the masses educated. Because they'd see how much they're getting fucked by said conservatives.

[–] DarrinBrunner@lemmy.world 14 points 6 days ago (1 children)

That's why they've been attacking public schools for decades, and why they push religion in schools.

The kids of the filthy rich go to private schools that teach capitalism the same way they have for generations.

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[–] Corporal_Punishment@feddit.uk 70 points 6 days ago (6 children)

To be liberal requires empathy. A deep understanding of others and their situations and the knowledge that your own personal needs dont always automatically outweigh others.

Empathy requires emotional intelligence.

Its easy to see it in action. Pick a problem and then look at the solutions offered by populist politicians to solve them.

In the UK one of the problems is immigrants arriving on small boats. The populist "solution"? "STOP THE BOATS" shouted far and wide.

How we ask?

And then silence. And when pressed, the likes of Reform offer more soundbites like "use the navy" and "send them back" but without any substance.

Meanwhile Liberal politicians offer actual solutions that are not sound bites, and they won't work quickly. Things like working with the French to find and arrest the people organising it. Helping to improve facilities in France and the rest of Europe so the UK isn't seen as somewhere an immigrant needs to travel to.

Basically, intelligent people aren't fooled by meaningless slogans. Morons aren't able to understand that deep problems require deep and complex solutions.

[–] Treczoks@lemmy.world 21 points 6 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago) (2 children)

It is not just a question of emotional intelligence. As an autistic person, this is really a weak point in my statistics.

I'm simply not stupid enough to fall for their ideas.

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[–] rekabis@lemmy.ca 13 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (2 children)

To be liberal requires empathy. A deep understanding of others and their situations and the knowledge that your own personal needs dont always automatically outweigh others.

Not strictly necessarily. For me, it comes down to logic, reason, and evidence.

I’m neurodivergent. This means that among some mild cognitive superpowers, I also have some significant weaknesses, such as an inability to understand or even recognize the inner workings of others. Essentially, the first half of your second sentence, above. That simply isn’t in my wheelhouse, no matter how hard I try. It’s analogous to asking a blind person to pick out the colour red.

But I reach the same place - the second half of the second sentence - by using logic and reason and evidence (usually via science) to come to an understanding of what is correct and good and right and how the needs of others simply don’t restrict my own personal needs in any way, and so carry equally as much importance and have all the same ability to be fulfilled without conflict. And because some of these people are disadvantaged or oppressed, it is my duty as a fucking human being to have their back whenever I have a decent opportunity to do so.

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[–] joan@lemmy.world 11 points 5 days ago

"My social media isn't an echo chamber"

[–] Bane_Killgrind@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 points 5 days ago (2 children)

As a high IQ person I would like to remind everyone that IQ has been coopted by a scientific racism and eugenics agenda, and the originator, a French man by the name of Alfred Binet,

"stressed that intellectual development progressed at variable rates and could be influenced by the environment; therefore, intelligence was not based solely on genetics, was malleable rather than fixed, and could only be found in children with comparable backgrounds."

We can only assume that any correlation in beliefs and scoring is the product of an environment which tends to produce both or inhibits the production of both. IE Fox News makes you dumb, and Fox News makes you conservative, concurrently. The study does not mention TV.

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[–] AlexLost@lemmy.world 22 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Men with high net worth are more conservative leaning?! Isn't that weird. Learning about the world builds compassion, while feeding your own greed breeds self interest. So weird. Remind me why we ask the opinions of rich people again?

[–] Phunter@lemmy.zip 11 points 6 days ago

Because if we make them feel valued they might give you some money. Do this enough times and you can be a rich asshole too!

[–] MagnificentSteiner@lemmy.zip 38 points 6 days ago (5 children)

IQ testing is pseudoscience. It's one of the preferred methods of the far right to try to differentiate between races for that very reason. Pseudoscience is a lot more malleable for their purposes than the settled science that says race doesn't exist biologically.

Having a "high IQ" is only proof that you're good at IQ tests.

[–] Zacryon@feddit.org 19 points 6 days ago* (last edited 6 days ago) (4 children)

Veritasium made a video talking about IQ tests, their validity and so on. https://youtu.be/FkKPsLxgpuY

One of my key takeaways: IQ tests have some validity as a diagnostic tool for asessing cognitive disabilities or illnesses, but they should not be taken as serious and significant as many less informed people seem to do.

[–] odelik@lemmy.today 11 points 6 days ago (1 children)

For your own privacy, and the privacy of everybody else interacting with you.

When you share a YouTube link, if you don't remove the si=ID, anybody that clicks on that link will then be associated with you. It's one of the tools Google uses to track your internet usage.

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[–] NotEasyBeingGreen@slrpnk.net 15 points 6 days ago (1 children)

It's not completely pseudo-science, as there are a lot of correlations with things like academic success or job performance:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_quotient#Social_correlations

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[–] GraniteM@lemmy.world 4 points 5 days ago (1 children)

[H]owever much all this soothes my vanity, and however much I appreciate being vice-president of Mensa, an organization which bases admission to its membership on IQ, I must, in all honesty, maintain that it means nothing.

What, after all, does such an intelligence test measure but those skills that are associated with intelligence by the individuals designing the test? And those individuals are subject to the cultural pressures and prejudices that force a subjective definition of intelligence. [...]

The whole thing is a self-perpetuating device. Men in intellectual control of a dominating section of society define themselves as intelligent, then design tests that are a series of clever little doors that can let through only minds like their own, thus giving them more evidence of "intelligence" and more examples of "intelligent people" and therefore more reason to devise additional tests of the same kind. More circular reasoning!

--Isaac Asimov, "Thinking About Thinking," 1975

[–] MagnificentSteiner@lemmy.zip 3 points 5 days ago

Great quote, thanks!

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A fact so obvious and apparent only a German would even bother asking.

[–] rekabis@lemmy.ca 25 points 6 days ago (2 children)

This is because reality itself has a strong left-leaning bias, and intelligence makes you encounter that a lot more as you interact with reality.

Sure, there are highly intelligent right-wingers, but intelligence only gives you the cognitive tools to discover reality, it doesn’t force you to use them. Just because a person is intelligent doesn’t mean they can’t slide off into wharrderp fantasy land.

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[–] Jankatarch@lemmy.world 24 points 6 days ago (1 children)

Fuck IQ. Literally political stance is a better measurement of intelligence.

Wait...

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[–] SaveTheTuaHawk@lemmy.ca 16 points 6 days ago

I will count of the list of Conservative scientists:

End of list

[–] DarkFuture@lemmy.world 12 points 6 days ago

Yeah, well, I've never felt smarter than when conversing with a conservative.

[–] SabinStargem@lemmy.today 5 points 5 days ago (1 children)

I am pretty sure that I would flunk IQ tests, and I have leftist preferences. Mathematics and other subjects of high learning are not something I really understand. While I appreciate neat things like electricity, chemistry, design, and AI, I simply don't understand them to any meaningful extent.

That sucks. I would like to have a character sheet with +10 bonuses across the board, and a platinum piece to start my game with. Same goes for the rest of the neighborhood.

[–] Bane_Killgrind@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 5 days ago (1 children)

There's no flunking an IQ test, but you are probably a normal median person.

[–] fishy@lemmy.today 6 points 5 days ago

The fact they don't think they're a genius and know their limits suggests they're probably smarter than average. I've found the dumbest people have an unshakable confidence they're always correct.

[–] Sam_Bass@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago (13 children)

So IQ is still a valid measuring method is it?

[–] AeonFelis@lemmy.world 12 points 6 days ago

The criteria for what counts as "valid measure method" is not "metrics that would make your ingroup look good".

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[–] baltakatei@sopuli.xyz 14 points 6 days ago

Traditional values are a crutch for the intellectually unambitious and a cudgel for the ambitious.

[–] infinitesunrise@slrpnk.net 3 points 5 days ago (1 children)
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[–] TerdFerguson@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago (4 children)

I'm going to ignore all the issues with this study, and just be happy there are people out there finding the data that shows conservatism is stupidity.

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[–] RoidingOldMan@lemmy.world 10 points 6 days ago (3 children)
[–] Bytemeister@lemmy.world 18 points 6 days ago

Knowing you aren't smart makes you smarter than all the people who think they are smart but actually aren't.

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