This is the sort of turn-of-century Mr. Burns type racism that I don't think most Americans even remember.

Suppose for the sake of argument, there's a place where everyone has 10 IQ points less, on average, than the West.

The Flynn effect is about 14 points over a few decades.

How do you square those things? Did the West not have a society a few decades ago? Is there some reason you can't have civilization with slightly dumber people? There was a time when kids were malnourished in the west, and possibly dumber as a result. Also, not everyone in society makes decisions. It tends to be very few people, and nobody thinks politicians are intelligent either.

I've never heard an explanation of intelligence that had any actual real-world impact on a scale that matters to society.

The explanation would have to have quite a lot of depth to it, as you have to come up with some sort of theory connecting how people do on a test to whatever you think makes a good society.

If anything it's probably a healthy reminder that even "smart" people can have blinders on?

Race isn't biological, it's a social and political construct. The social and political construct known as "Asians" comprises about 60% of the global population. Also, IQ is not a measure of intelligence.

There are cultural reasons why some people in some "Asian" countries may do better on average in academics, such as stronger familial bonds, peer pressure and a greater cultural value placed on scholastic achievement, but that's far from proof that "Asians" are genetically and intellectually superior to other races, much less that therefore eugenics (and by extension the white supremacist ideology it was created to normalize, which ironically considered "Asians" to be subhuman) is "proven true."

You do realize that picking a certain concept "intelligence", defining it to include certain characteristics, tying it to a certain notion of "fitness", defining "Asian", and finally, tying "asian" to "intelligence", are all matters of definition, choice, and perception and nothing fundamental about reality, right?

At the time, scientists already suspected a corkscrew structure but there was disagreement between what that looked like or whether it was double or triple helixed.

Franklin's key experiments resulted in the Photograph 51 that almost single-handedly proved the structure. Before Franklin could publish her data, Wilkins—without the consent or knowledge of Franklin—took that photo and showed Watson. Watson later stated that his mouth dropped when he saw the photo. It proved to him the double helix structure and that guided the rest of their modeling/work. At that point they knew what they were proving. Two months later they'd advanced their model far enough and rushed to publication before Franklin could be credited with her own work

Not only did they use Franklin's work without her consent, not only did they not credit her, but they even belittled her in their books and talks. They even referred to her as "Rosy", a name she never used herself.

> During a symposium held for centenarian Albert Hofmann, Hofmann said Mullis had told him that LSD had "helped him develop the polymerase chain reaction that helps amplify specific DNA sequences".

We are not talking about disagreeableness that causes someone to pursue an unconventional path to discovery. We are talking about cheating, pure and simple. I hope you are not claiming that science rests on such behavior.

Society tends to transfer skills/talent/achievement/luck in one field and assume those attributes hold good in all fields because they were successful in one area, even if there is no justification, so their beliefs tend to carry lot more weight and influence than the average joe and hold the field back.

Talented people when sidetracked may no longer be as effective contributors, for example Einstein's dogmatic beliefs in aspects of quantum mechanics or similar other topics likely partially contributed to his diminished contributions in later part of his life.

Ideally the best case is balance between being courageous to hold any kind of belief strongly even if its not conventional wisdom, but also at the same be willing to change in the face of strong evidence.