[ExI] end of worlders - was managing omnicidal maniacs

[Henry Rivera]

My anecdotal experience is that most vegetarians I know (who are vegetarians out of compassion) have higher than average IQs by my estimate (saying this as a psychologist who is familiar with IQs, a vegetarian, and someone with an established IQ a many standard deviations above normal). I concede this is less than convincing evidence and can be accounted for in other ways but is my experience. 

I also see highly successful people (who presumably have higher IQs--I know, debatable) who then become philanthropists gravitate towards ambitious compassionate causes like ending hunger or diseases. I also know successful people who only value having more fancy cars, but a majority value compassion. Selection and other biases could be at play in my data however. 

As Maslow noted, it's easier to deal with higher order needs and ideals when one's survival needs have been met. 

Perhaps my bias is the belief that most people are compassionate. It's just that most are too preoccupied with survival to act on that. Maybe people with higher IQs by consistently being able to meet their survival needs are able to behave more consistent with their values which I am suggesting in most includes compassion. 

And this could all be spurious reasoning on my part. 

-Henry

> On Sep 10, 2015, at 6:23 PM, Tara Maya <tara at taramayastales.com> wrote:
> 
> In all seriousness… The fallacy, of course, is that people of higher IQs are more compassionate. What evidence supports that? 
> 
> Tara Maya
> Blog  |  Twitter  |  Facebook  |  Amazon  |  Goodreads
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> 
>> On Sep 10, 2015, at 1:09 PM, William Flynn Wallace <foozler83 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>> An old scifi story sticks in my mind - aliens gas the planet, killing off all people with IQs below 150.  If you could kill off the teeming masses some consider no longer needed in this world, what would you do?  Me?  Could not do it, I think.....but it would surely save us a lot of difficulty and save many animals from going extinct.  What if you could push the button and make them sterile?
>> 
>> bill w
> 
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