The more intelligent gender?

[LSN80]

http://www.avoiceformen.com/feminism/why-men-are-more-intelligent-than-women/

In a topic I never imagined we'ld be having in 2011, Neuroscientist Susan Greenfield wrote a book entitled The Private Life of The Brain. In said book, she discussed her theory that the more a person is affected by emotion, the less they use their brains. She further claims that:

1. Women are more emotional then men, therefore less intelligent.

"The more emotion you have, the less mind you have. The less mind one has, the less intelligent one is. And what gender uses more emotion then the other? The female gender, one would suspect."

2. Women are focused on the past or future, meaning theyre less mindful.

This is only one of the ways in which Greenfield discusses how men are more intelligent then women. Greenfield goes on to describe how women are less likely to learn about their past and plan for their future, with relation to the present. Greenfield believes they do these things with emotion, but not with the same productivity of learning from the past or being realistic of their futures while living in the present. Greenfield calls this mindfulness, the state of an active, present focus on the present. Because, statistically speaking, women function with less mindfulness, they function with less intelligence.

Relatively speaking, compared to men, the conclusion must be that women are less often ‘accessing the past, or the future, or anything ‘inside’ ‘ – statistically, that is.All in all, therefore, women seem to function less ‘mindfully’ than men, or, putting it less euphemistically, less ‘intelligently’.

3. Men take on take on more of the intelligent-provoking ‘environment’, and they interact with it in much more of an objective and emotionless way.

What Greenfield is suggesting here is that men are more likely to seek out more difficult tasks with a greater focus then women. She discusses how men are less likely to multitask the way women are, and obsess intellectually about getting things done more efficiently then women do. In doing so, they become more intelligent. Women, Greenfield claims, have less focus, quit easier, do the bare minimum to get by, and aren't passionate about the things they do. Greenfield expounds on this:

Just as it is that women, statistically speaking, prefer men who are taller than them and richer than them, they prefer men who are socially higher up the ladder than them, so it is that they prefer men who are more intelligent than them. In fact, most women believe their partner to be more intelligent then them. And they're right!

When I read Greenfield's quote here, she makes women sound as if they are, statistically speaking, intimidated by and view themselves as inferior to men. It's almost a "Know your Role" type of thing, where women believe they need a certain type of man to validate themselves, because they're unable to find validation in themselves. This is more indicative of an belief Id expect to hear from a man rather then a woman. Greenfield continues:

And until such time as women CHOOSE partners who are less than, or equal to, themselves in terms of intelligence, the statement that ‘men are more intelligent than women’ will remain true even when looking at the issue as it relates to partnerships between men and women.When it comes to looking at men and women as they function within their relationships, men are MOSTLY more intelligent than their female partners.
But, of course, we all know this instinctively, we juswt choose not to say so.

When I first read several articles on Greenfield and her strong views of men being more intelligent then women, and the factors that play into this, I thought it was just the viewpoint of one woman. But I found articles from 2006, 2007, and 2009 that say similar things from different people. Many of them echo the "women are more emotional, which costs them intellect" point of view. Another popular sentiment is this:

4.If civilization had been left in female hands, we would still all be living in grass huts.

Greenfield and her contempories believe that if women had been the dominant gender, then they would have used their influence to promote further emotionalizing. As a result, there would have been less achievement with regard to developing other things, and civilaztion would be in a far worse place in terms of technological advancement and the intellectual development of people. Greenfield further expands:

This, of course, partly explains why the educational systems in the west are currently failing so miserably to produce high standards in their pupils. There is too much emotionalizing going on, and not enough thinking; i.e. not enough mind. And, in the past, those little societies that spent their time emotionalizing, instead of creating, inventing and progressing, had no chance in evolutionary terms. They lost the battle long ago. The men were killed and the women were carried away. And they no longer exist. They have been statistically washed away.

Greenfield says so much more here, but I hit on the major points of what she is saying. All in all, there are several problems I have with this view on genders and intelligence.

Firstly, for as much as was discussed on the ideas of statistics regarding the intelligence gap between men and women, none were provided. She discusses how women "statistically speaking" use their emotions more then men, and claims that emotion not only affects reasoning, but it decreases intelligence. That's an opinion, nothing more. Im of the opinion that a good blend of emotion and mindfulness make for the most intelligent people, as people to the extreme of emotion or being non-emotive, generally speaking, miss alot of things because of being narrow minded.

Second, I believe that the success of men and lack thereof for women has nothing to do with mindfulness and intelligence, and much more to do with opportunity. The idea of a woman winning a Presidential election or even being nominated is still a ludicrous one in 2011. For as advanced as we claim to be in the US, we are still very much a sexist society who relies on the notion of "places" for men and women. Men are to be the breadwinner, and women the homemaker. I remember seeing an Episode of Who Wants to be a Millionaire about 10 years ago where Regis asked a male contestant his occupation, and he told Regis he was a stay at home dad. Both Regis and the audience laughed at him. So much of the success of men as compared to women in so many ways is due to opportunities given, not states of mindfulness and emotion.

These are my views on Greenfield's beliefs, now Im interested in hearing yours.

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

Any other thoughts or discussion on this subject are welcome as always.

 

[Paralyzer Z]

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

THIS is something I have uncovered gradually throughout my life. From my observations of females (much to the apparent disapproval of Lilac) women have always shown more emotion, sometimes for no reason. Every time I see a woman 90% of the time they will have an emotion on their face, mostly positive feelings at that. Does this is in anyway tie in with intelligence? In my opinion yes! When you are emotional you are in less control of your actions and logic levels are decreasing the more emotion-driven you get. Girls always wonder why I am so smart ( I am not being narcissistic ) yet they pay little attention to things that do not bring feelings into a situation an example would be school work. They tend to pay more attention to personal things like relationships. It blocks their intelligence to a certain extent.


Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

The first three i can agree with to a certain extent. however the last one is a great example of a hyperbole. I do not think we would still be living in huts but I do believe that we would not be as much of an advanced society. I will say one thing though that we may have more people on this earth....JK. While women may not have as much logic as men we would still be somewhat of a modern society. However that is not to say that men cannot be overtaken by emotion. Crimes are usually committed or correlated to emotion.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

Well that may not be the case in first world countries. Civil rights have granted women high positions of power in more developed countries. However in third world countries it is safe to say that traditions of male domination have been the majority of head in terms of government. even without counting third world countries Men still have higher positions of power in general, there are just more men in power.

By the way I am not in anyway a sexist.

 

[RicoLen]

Intelligence has to do with the problem solving ability, and how fast you are at it.

Wisdom has to do with how well you apply what you've learned to achieve the best outcome.

Memory recall has nothing to do with either Intelligence, nor wisdom, but a person with a photographic memory is often considered the most intelligent person of all.

Gender only has a slight baring on wisdom. Men get clouded with anger & lust, women with apathy & revenge, ultimately those hormonal imbalances can be overcome by willpower, and to suggest that gender has a baring on how intelligent a person is negates the responsibility one has to oneself to live their own lives and make their own choices for themselves and not be influenced by others unless by choice.

 

[SalvIsWin]

Entire article is a farce.

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

Are women more emotional? Yes, they evolved that way and there is clear scientific proof that shows this. Is there a correlation between emotionality and intelligence? What kind of intelligence? That's the real question.

This article is such a load of bullshit. Intelligence is such a broad, broad quality that it's very, very difficult to accurately measure it. You can know a lot of facts, but be completely socially inept - are you intelligent? Let's say you live in a big city, where you need to know how to take public transit, operate vehicles, read signals, and work a 9-5 job. Let's say you live in Africa where you need to hunt for your food, and know where you are in a jungle, and which moss is poisonous - take the person from the city and put them there, who's more intelligent now, the native or the city dweller? There's intelligence for specific roles and lifestyles, and then there are completely different levels of what would be intelligent for other roles and lifestyles. This article assumes that what a Westerner would call, 'intelligent' is the true or pure definition of the term.

So because you can't define the term in any real specificity, I don't think you can say there is any correlation. I could name many domains in which men are better than women, and many domains where women are better than men.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

All of them I disagree with. #1 - #3 focuses on the arbitrary definition of intelligence that the author decided was correct, whereas #4 is totally without any specificity. Women weren't evolved to do the role that men did, and men didn't evolve to do the role that women did when we were hunter-gatherers. Saying that if left to the hands of women, we would be living in grass huts makes as much sense as saying if it were up to men to bear and raise children we would be dead - it might be technically true but it's total fallacy.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

Of course they are. Men have almost always been in a superior position because men evolved to be the physically stronger, athletic, bigger etc gender. It makes complete sense therefore that men would be in a dominant position. In fact, contrary to the entire sentiment of the article, the dominance gap between men and women has been closing because being dominant is less and less about being stronger, faster, bigger - which is a mans strong suit, and more about being creative - which is a womens strong suit. I don't know where the article got the idea that men are more creative, I thought it was common knowledge that women have more creative juices - I believe there's been studies on it.

 

[Mustang Sally]

Second, I believe that the success of men and lack thereof for women has nothing to do with mindfulness and intelligence, and much more to do with opportunity.

A person could go on and on about this subject, but you've hit the essence of it with that statement. There's a critical difference between genetics and culture. When someone makes the comment: Women are less intelligent than men, you'll naturally think of genetics; that women have been created by God to be less intelligent. But I think the differences that have been bred into both genders are cultural in nature, not genetic. We've seen thousands of years of women being "put in their place" and the results of the generational sophistry would certainly manifest itself with the conclusion that women aren't as smart as men.

That's the key, though: it's not that women were created to be less intelligent than man.....it's that they've been bred to use their intelligence in different ways, thereby making them seem less smart.

One cause of the whole mess is the physical size advantage men have over women. By nature, guys are bigger and stronger and have been trained to solve a problem by plowing through the middle of it, obliterating forces that might stand in the way. That, by the way, is one reason more technological advances have come from men than women. Discovery is bold, forceful and sometimes dangerous....through history, men have been like that, women less so.

Women, who are by nature physically smaller and weaker, tend to use their "emotionalism" to think around the corners of problems rather than solving the Gordian knot by cutting right through it. We don't have the physical strength guys do, so we have to come up with alternate solutions. It's not a matter of being less intelligent, although it may appear as exactly that.

But, as the years go on, it's all changing......and Dr. Greenfield should be mindful of that. More than ever before in history, women are learning to take their rightful place alongside men as cultural boundaries are removed.

But it takes a lot of time.

Hear us roar.

 

[Dagger Dias]

1. Women are more emotional then men, therefore less intelligent.

I don't agree with this theory at all. People who listen to their emotions and understand them are downright brilliant sometimes. It takes a significant amount of intelligence to truly understand one's emotions. Not all "geniuses" are emotionless, and not all people in tune with their emotions are unintelligent.

2. Women are focused on the past or future, meaning theyre less mindful.

No it doesn't. This theory is wrong too. What's so bad about keeping a firm grip on one's cherished memories or things that helped shape who you are, or making decisions with the idea of a better tomorrow? I would argue that those who remember the past or focus on the future are in fact MORE mindful. Those who live only in the now are the ones who are not mindful. They completely ignore the consequences of their actions.

3. Men take on take on more of the intelligent-provoking ‘environment’, and they interact with it in much more of an objective and emotionless way.

I hate how people think doing this makes one smarter. Despite being male, I take the emotional path in most cases. It depends on the type of person you were created to be. Some are more objective. Others are more emotional. Being emotional does not make you less intelligent.

4.If civilization had been left in female hands, we would still all be living in grass huts.

Common misconception by men who are not secure in who they are. Yes, men are traditionally the "leaders" but if a strong man does not step up and a strong woman does, she would be a better leader than a weak man would. That being said, I do try to follow tradition by being the leader whether that be in my family, in the workplace, or anywhere else where I can lead by example. Women can be good leaders too if given the option.

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

The stereotype says that women are more emotional than men. This is due to society passing down an issue from generation to generation that men are not "manly" if they are in tune with their emotions. I have always been very against that stereotype. I'm as emotional as they get when it comes to males, and not afraid to admit it. This has no correlation between intelligence though. I know people of both genders who are emotional AND very intelligent. I don't think that any gender is by default smarter than the other because we are all human beings and intelligence depends on our individual biological structures, not our gender.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

I disagree with all of them, see above paragraphs.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

More men step up than women, due to men being the traditional leaders. I do support this tradition, but at the same time would not deny a woman the option to be in a leadership position if she desired it. Everyone deserves a chance.

 

[RicoLen]

Second, I believe that the success of men and lack thereof for women has nothing to do with mindfulness and intelligence, and much more to do with opportunity.

A person could go on and on about this subject, but you've hit the essence of it with that statement.

Here's the problem with that theory though. I'm a man in a woman's world, and my success as a stay at home dad is marginalized because I'm nothing like your typical stay at home mom. I'm not into arts & crafts. I don't bake cookies. I keep the house clean, I do the laundry, and cook, help the kids with their homework, I change my youngest one's diapers, etc., etc.. I wouldn't even mind being in the PTA, or in some after school group or something like that, except here where I live we have a thing called "MOPS" Mothers of Pre-Schoolers. Really? By their own name they exclude fathers. They say fathers are welcome but it's a woman's world.

I simply don't fit in. I don't have anything to talk about with other stay at home parents because 90% of them are women.

This is the inverse of what women deal with in the workplace, except that it has been a big deal to make sure that changes here in the US for the last 20+ years. There is no such movement to do the same for stay at home dads.

As a matter of fact, when I go out of the house with my kids I'm constantly being treated like an irresponsible parent. I rough house with my kids, I tease them and they tease me back, we watch wrestling together, play video games together, we go to the park and I let them get dirty and then toss them in the back of the truck (it has a shell on it) and have them change their clothes before getting in the cab which I keep pristine. My daughter (age 8) plays a guitar and has judo as after school activities and my son (not quite 7) just picked up Karate. They don't play soccer, or build diorama's or make macaroni pictures.

I made the mistake of taking my daughter out in public after she fell while she was playing outside and hit her cheek on a rock (we live in the Sierra Nevada foothills and there are granite boulders as big as our house everywhere) and she had a bit of a shiner. I had one woman nearly call the cops on me. She would have if my kids hadn't talked her down.

I've had so many play dates turned down because the women find out that the kids their own children want to go play with have a dad at home instead of a mommy. It's even worse with my daughter, who had a slumber party for her 8th b-day this year, and we had to assure everyone that I wouldn't be around for the party, and that my wife would, because they didn't trust me with their daughters.

Yeah that's right, I'm a man, and so obviously I'm abusive physically, sexually, & emotionally as a result and should be in jail, and most certainly not trusted with children, least of all girls.

Point is, this stupid sexism crap goes both ways. Women, in my experience think they're better parents and know best how to raise good children, and that men are inferior.

It bugs me that women for the last 20 years have been complaining about how much harder it is for women than a man, but they're just hypocrites. You reverse the roles for both genders and it's harder for a man to get by in a woman's world than it is for a woman in a man's world.

 

[¡Roján!]

Great thread LSN.

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

On a general note, then I doubt many people can really disagree with the fact that women are definitely more emotional than men. Whether it affects intelligence or not is a different story. It's commonly known that women are cleverer than men, something we accept. However, the fact that they are very emotional beings can change that around. Whenever feeling and passions get in the way of clear thinking, wrong and reckless choices can be made. Whether it be in the middle of an exam, an urge to right down an answer that you may be wrong, it will affect your intelligence. Well, not your intelligence as a whole, but how much you're getting out of it. But, let's not forget emotions can also urge you to make a right choice. So, to retreat back to the original question of correlation between emotion and intelligence. Well, I think there is but whether this is a hindrance or an advantage has yet to be seen.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

I probably disagree with the first three to a high extent. However, I partially agree with the last point. We obviously wouldn't be living in grass huts but, as a whole, society would be a lot more rudimentary. The main problem I see with women is the lack of leadership and will. They just conform, which is why there are very few female politicians. It is also probably why it took them so long to get any kind of rights.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

As much as we hate to admit it, we are. Perhaps not in USA or UK but, in most other cultures women are looked at is subordinates to men. Is it fair? Hell to the no. Even in countries like Spain, France and Italy women get paid less than men. It's a shame, but some peoples mentalities will never change.

 

[SD619]

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there any correlation between this and intelligence?

In general, yes, women are more emotional than men. Also, they express their emotions more freely and openly. Men, on the other hand, either are bad at expressing emotions or prefer not to do it altogether.

I do feel that emotion has any direct relation with intelligence. Intelligence is mostly an inherent trait of a human and is generally not affected by external factors. Emotions affect decision-making, positively or negatively, depending upon the situation.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

I do not agree with the first three. As i said before, intelligence is inherent. As far as the fourth point, it is an exaggeration. Society would surely have been different if women were more dominant, but not to the level described.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

Yes, men are in more prominent positions in the society. It is mainly due to two reasons. Firstly, they have been in prominent positions throughout history. Until recent centuries, women have mostly been confined to their homes. This obviously gives men an advantage.

Secondly, men are better at applying their knowledge and intelligence. Most prominent scientists/innovators are men because of this reason.

 

[Poop Master Flex]

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

In my experience they are more emotional but that doesn't necessarily mean they are less intelligent (in all fairness I've met a lot of guys that are extremely emotional). I've met plenty of smart men and plenty of smart women and in both cases found many of them quite adept at problem solving skills.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

If any of the points I may agree with its men's ability to make decisions in a less objective way. Understand I can only go by what I have seen in the past but its one of the reasons I think women are more emotional, they often let emotions get in the way of decision making like backing a friend who cheated on their boyfriend for instance whereas myself would call out my friend for cheating on theirs no matter what the reason. I've often found men to be a lot less objective in their decision making process and removing their emotions from their decision making, I haven't seen that with women all that much.

Once again I'm only going by what I have seen and I've seen men often let their emotions get in the way of sound decision making as well but it doesn't necessarily mean its sex related it could very well be a coincidence and the people I've interacted with in life (which like almost everyone is a shit ton of both men and women).

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

This is absolute grade A bullshit. Men were once in more prominent positions in society but that's because of the stone age mentality that men are bread winners and women are homemakers. Its just the way the world worked for 4000 years as men were always perceived as the dominant species and women were mostly kept at home and were never treated on an equal level, that's society's fault not women in general (and religion too). If you are taught that women are lesser than men your whole life you are going to eventually believe it even if its false, much like everyone once believed the earth was flat.

The truth is women only recently were given the chance to be on the same level as the men for the most part and so its only recently women have responded, if this was a 100 years ago everyone would be saying men are superior. You got to understand men have had thousands of years to establish themselves at the top of the food chain so to speak whereas women have had 30 years at best.

Even in a male dominated era a lot of women have done great things even against all odds where they were constantly being held down.

 

[Good Golly It's Ollie]

LSN has rep-messaged me saying I should post in his threads more often. It's 5am where I am right now so I'll keep this as brief as possible to sum up my views. Obviously, my opinion is scuppered because I am male and have little concept of what life as a woman is like. Anyway as a bloke, I've learned early that the intelligence of women should be respected. This is a very PC standing point but, I think, a very much justified one, even opposed as I am to the blatant unconcern for misandry that we have in our society.

Re: Point 1. I don't think it's a good idea to say "more intelligent". That, in my view, is a bad way of wording it. It's more like different things are more important to the different sexes. It's been known for a long time that generally, women use emotion to gauge what's a good idea and men use logic. A woman is usually thinking "what do I feel" whereas a man's approach is usually more along the lines of "what are the hypothetical consequences".

Also this person is chucking the word "mind" all over the place despite it being largely immeasurable and not even tangible.

Re: Point 2. "Women are focused on the past or future ... less mindful". True in a sense, but it's very advantageous to put hindsight and foresight to use when considering things like choosing the right career or partner. Women generally are the choosers while men are the trophies; as much as you might not think this to be the case it is built into both biology and evolution. A woman invests more in childbirth than a man does - hence, she more carefully considers who & who not to shag. Even subconsciously, when you're in a place in life where you don't want kids, this is on the back of a chick's mind. What's further down the road? I would encourage all men to think more like women do in this respect.

Re: Point 3. This part I do actually agree with. Men are expected more of in this respect, because the idea that women go out into the world and have careers is, all things considered, relatively new - that is, under 150 years old, generally speaking.

And now LSN's questions.

Are women more emotional than men as a general role? If so, is there any correlation between this and intelligence?
I think they're more emotional but as stated already, I feel this is not so much "less intelligent" as it is a different modus operandi. It's like you know, if I have a PC and you have a Mac; we run our computers in different ways to greater or lesser efficiency but the end result is still a sensible and coherent one to the individual that walks that path.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent than women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?
As already stated my general feeling is that decent evolutionary-based points are made but worded badly. A different way of saying things would be preferable. There's a difference between logic and emotion, but they're both forms of intelligence.

Take my dad for example. I should explain - he's pretty smart in a logical sense; he has an IQ of 147 and has written three books with a fourth in the making. But in terms of social interaction, I don't know how to say it better than he is fucking tactless. Not in a nasty way. He just has a poor concept of what people consider to be offensive. What's a joke to him is usually not so to others. My mother on the other hand, she's no blunt knife but she's nowhere near my dad in the whole IQ/intellectual respects. She however gets socialising a lot better and my friends all love her and are largely indifferent to my father besides "respecting his intelligence". Now ask me which of my parents I'd consider to be more intelligent, generally. Yup. My mum. Mostly because, people who don't know my dad seem to assume he's clever.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society than women as a whole? Why or why not?
Yeah, it still happens. Because we're still coming out of the gender imbalance. We're on the cuff of a transition period in history. As I said it's actually still quite a new idea that women and men can be equal, only 100 or so years, less than that even. And there are many places or cultures where women are still treated as inferior. Even in the UK.

Now the following is not meant to bash any religion, it's just an observation. I can walk into Tesco and see an Islamic couple. The guy is wearing Abercrombie and Fitch hoodie, River Island belt, Calvin Klein jeans, Converse shoes, whatever. The woman however, has to wear the garb of her people. Dressed like a fucking Ringwraith. How sexist is that, that the guy's "allowed" to wear western dress and the woman isn't? Trivial thing, but at the same time still appalling.

Okay I said brief, but I lied and it's now 5:28 so I'll stop for now.

 

[TWJC: The Beginning]

Women aren't more emotional, they just show it more. Men bottle it up. Don't try to argue with me, I have an aunt with a PhD in psychology, my girlfriend is a psych major, and one of my good friends is working on her PhD in psych. they ALL say that this is a huge misunderstanding. Being emotional can mean mentally going batshit crazy but bottling it up in an unhealthy manor, or physically expressing your emotions in an unhealthy manor.

Women are more likely to call you a bastard and then cry about it and feel bad. Men are more likely to cut your head off and throw your body in a lake.

Neither gender is more intelligent, they both have strengths and weaknesses that match up surprisingly well. Typically what guys are bad at, women are good at and vice versa.

Most of this seems to be based around emotion. Which is dumb. It's HEALTHY to be somewhat emotional. It's HEALTHY to get your emotions out.

You can go to the extremes. Sure the white trash ****e with 9 kids by age 26 who cusses and cries and screams and slashes people's tires and doesn't understand why the world doesn't revolve around her is a pretty emotional and stupid being. However, so is the douche who's 28, still single, driving a mustang, wearing affliction shirts, and drinks all the time, but is still living in a crappy apartment because he bottles up his emotion and the only way he feels he can get the attention he craves (secretly) is by doing all these stupid things to get attention despite how bad they are for him.

All in all they're the same. There is a yin to every yang. Some women let emotion get the best of them, some men let bottling up their emotion get the best of them.

The most intelligent men I know are also guys who aren't afraid to say "I'm scared of this" or even cry. The most intelligent women I know have a healthy way of letting their emotions out and don't let them affect their decision-making.

 

[Hulk Hogan's Brother]

I cannot believe that someone has actually decided to write a book based on the gibberish that men like to talk about after two drinks. The views of Susan Greenfield seem to highly naive, particularily if all this is coming from a neuroscientist. I men lesser qualified men have been making such assumptions for decades and lesser qualified women have been proving them wrong on a daily basis.

The author has taken a very myopic view of what intelligence is all about. We men may be more goal oriented but at the same time we are more stubborn at times and may sometimes overlook some of the fallacies in our plan. Life is not exactly a sprint, it's more like hurdles and sometimes overcoming those hurdles is as important as getting to the finish line. I believe that women are better at that as evolution has made them more cautious and caring by nature.

Which brings me to the conclusion that the author has presented. I can see some of the scientific discoveries being stalled in a women dominated society, most of which involve a high amount of risk, like say Space Travel. But then I also think that we would be living in a more peaceful society not ravaged by the after effects of a World War or a 9/11.

In conclusion, all I want to say is that intelligence cannot be measured. The world is too diverse for intelligence to be quantified. The problems are just too many and of different types and in most cases, there is more than one correct solution to it.

 

[Calderownz]

Are women more emotional then men as a general role? If so, is there aany correlation between this and intelligence?

I think that it's probably true that woman are -- at the very least -- more outwardly emotional, but it depends on the emotion. Anger is an emotion. Men are probably more outwardly emotional in that sense. Still, I'd probably agree with the author that women are a bit more emotional more often than not.

That being said, I don't think it reflects upon one's intelligence. I do, however, feel that it can negatively affect one's decision-making. Overtly emotional people will likely make poorer decisions. Their emotions will make them, rather. While this doesn't make someone out and out stupid, it certainly is a quick way to being labeled a stupid person.

Greenfield made four major points on why men are more intelligent then women? Are there any you strongly agree or disagree with?

In truth, I agree with her on some portions of the points and disagree with another. Therefore, I'll leave this essentially blank and just continue to discuss the overall matter at hand.

Do you believe men are in more prominent positions in society then women as a whole? Why or why not?

Yes, and I believe it because it's undeniable. The reason behind this isn't really being questioned here, but it's simply true.

I recently read a statistic, and I wish I could source it, but it was something along these lines: virtually all companies have at least ONE woman involved in a position of substantial power. The intriguing portion of this equation isn't that women are in all board meetings. But rather, that the minimum is one. Meaning, that more often than not, it's usually one. Otherwise, that minimum would clearly be higher.

That's just fact. I could go on and on about this, but I'm positive that ANYONE on this forum has had a male boss. I couldn't say the same about everyone having had a female boss. That's as simple as you can put it.


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The biggest problem I have with her thoughts is that oh-so-tiresome argument that the world would be different (in any way) if women ran the world. It wouldn't be. By and large, women are about the same as men in terms of actions. They are handled differently, perhaps, but by and large, we'd have about as many wars, as many problems and about as many advances. Perhaps less, perhaps more. Perhaps advances we don't have now, lacking advances we do have now. But, in truth, it'd balance out.

There is simply no proof that the opposite would even be remotely true. No truth that we'd have less wars. No truth that we'd live in tree-huts because of an over-ride in emotions. That's just fucking absurd, to put it mildly.

 

[Sparky]

There is no such thing. it can't be defined. you could argue that on average on gender is smarter then the other but it still wouldn't be 100% fullproof. It depends on the person in general. both my sister 10 and brother 12 are smart yet my sister is smarter then my brother. It just depends on if you're interested in the stuff that "makes" you smart. My brother is interested in playing video games and cricket. My sister wants to be a vet when she's older so she pays attention at school because she knows you need good grades. but it don't mean females are smarter.

if that didn't make sense,
There is no proof at all that one gender is the smarter sex. it all depends on what you're interested in, not what sex you are.