Intelligence and Human Progress

Intelligence and Human Progress
Author: James Flynn
Publisher: Elsevier
Total Pages: 126
Release: 2013-06-07
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0124170188

Written by James R. Flynn of the "Flynn effect" (the sustained and substantial increase in intelligence test scores across the world over many decades), Intelligence and Human Progress examines genes and human achievement in all aspects, including what genes allow and forbid in terms of personal life history, the cognitive progress of humanity, the moral progress of humanity, and the cross-fertilization of the two. This book presents a new method for weighing family influences versus genes in the cognitive abilities of individuals, and counters the arguments of those who dismiss gains in IQ as true cognitive gains. It ranges over topics including: how family can handicap those taking the SAT; new IQ thresholds for occupations that show elite occupations are within reach of the average American; what Pol Pot did to the genetic potential of Cambodia; why dysgenics (the deterioration of human genes over the generations) is important, but no menace for the foreseeable future; and what might derail human intellectual progress. Researchers in developmental and cognitive psychology, educators, and professionals involved in intelligence testing or psychometrics will benefit from the perspectives offered here. But beyond that, anyone interested in the potential of the human mind will be engaged and challenged by one of the most important contemporary thinkers on the subject.

Enlightenment Now

Enlightenment Now
Author: Steven Pinker
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 578
Release: 2018-02-13
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0525427570

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF 2018 ONE OF THE ECONOMIST'S BOOKS OF THE YEAR "My new favorite book of all time." --Bill Gates If you think the world is coming to an end, think again: people are living longer, healthier, freer, and happier lives, and while our problems are formidable, the solutions lie in the Enlightenment ideal of using reason and science. By the author of the new book, Rationality. Is the world really falling apart? Is the ideal of progress obsolete? In this elegant assessment of the human condition in the third millennium, cognitive scientist and public intellectual Steven Pinker urges us to step back from the gory headlines and prophecies of doom, which play to our psychological biases. Instead, follow the data: In seventy-five jaw-dropping graphs, Pinker shows that life, health, prosperity, safety, peace, knowledge, and happiness are on the rise, not just in the West, but worldwide. This progress is not the result of some cosmic force. It is a gift of the Enlightenment: the conviction that reason and science can enhance human flourishing. Far from being a naïve hope, the Enlightenment, we now know, has worked. But more than ever, it needs a vigorous defense. The Enlightenment project swims against currents of human nature--tribalism, authoritarianism, demonization, magical thinking--which demagogues are all too willing to exploit. Many commentators, committed to political, religious, or romantic ideologies, fight a rearguard action against it. The result is a corrosive fatalism and a willingness to wreck the precious institutions of liberal democracy and global cooperation. With intellectual depth and literary flair, Enlightenment Now makes the case for reason, science, and humanism: the ideals we need to confront our problems and continue our progress.

Science and Human Progress

Science and Human Progress
Author: Oliver Sir Lodge
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 188
Release: 2016-02-12
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 131727539X

Originally delivered as a series of lectures for the Halley Stewart trust in 1926, Lodge’s work was collected and first published in 1927. Lodge uses his scientific training to inquire into such general issues as religion, human progress, and societal advances with an aim to better understand the physical order of the universe. This title will be of interest to students of philosophy, particularly those interested in the development of early twentieth century thought.

Open

Open
Author: Johan Norberg
Publisher: Atlantic Books
Total Pages: 431
Release: 2020-09-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1786497174

AN ECONOMIST BOOK OF THE YEAR Humanity's embrace of openness is the key to our success. The freedom to explore and exchange - whether it's goods, ideas or people - has led to stunning achievements in science, technology and culture. As a result, we live at a time of unprecedented wealth and opportunity. So why are we so intent on ruining it? From Stone Age hunter-gatherers to contemporary Chinese-American relations, Open explores how across time and cultures, we have struggled with a constant tension between our yearning for co-operation and our profound need for belonging. Providing a bold new framework for understanding human history, bestselling author and thinker Johan Norberg examines why we're often uncomfortable with openness - but also why it is essential for progress. Part sweeping history and part polemic, this urgent book makes a compelling case for why an open world with an open economy is worth fighting for more than ever.

Research Foundations of Human Development and Family Science

Research Foundations of Human Development and Family Science
Author: Kathleen D. Dyer
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 262
Release: 2022-02-21
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 1000528820

Human Development and Family Science (HDFS) is an interdisciplinary and applied field that draws from developmental science, family science, and other social sciences. Research Foundations of Human Development and Family Science is a textbook that provides an introduction to the diverse scientific research methods that form the foundation of scholarship and practice in HDFS. In Part I, Kathleen D. Dyer explores science. She distinguishes empirical scientific research from common sense and from knowledge gained from personal experience. This section also includes a discussion of the strategies used by pseudoscience to exploit the well-deserved credibility of science, providing relevant examples. Part II examines systematic empiricism through sampling and measurement. HDFS scholars use a wide array of measurement tools, including self-report (interviews, questionnaires, and self-report tasks), observations (participant, naturalistic, and structured), objective tests, physiological measures, and several types of archival records. Part III introduces the use of study design to achieve falsifiability in scientific research, including an overview of various orientations to time used in research as well as four different study designs: qualitative, prevalence, correlational, and experimental. Finally, Part IV addresses the public verifiability of science, including how scientific consensus is developed, the use of literature reviews to identify convergence of evidence, and how scientific literacy translates into evidence-based professional practice. Illustrated throughout with studies foundational to the discipline as examples of the strategies described in the text, Research Foundations for Human Development and Family Science is a comprehensive, accessible core textbook for undergraduate research methods classes in HDFS. It introduces the discipline of HDFS and challenges students to understand the limitations of common sense and the threat of pseudoscience for those work professionally with children and families.

The Human Spark

The Human Spark
Author: Jerome Kagan
Publisher: Basic Books
Total Pages: 354
Release: 2013-06-04
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0465037739

As infants we are rife with potential. For a short time, we have before us a seemingly infinite number of developmental paths. Soon, however, we become limited to certain paths as we grow into unique products of our genetics and experience. But what factors account for the variation -- in skills, personalities, values -- that results? How do experiences shape what we bring into the world? In The Human Spark, pioneering psychologist Jerome Kagan offers an unflinching examination of personal, moral, and cultural development that solidifies his place as one of the most influential psychologists of the past century. In this definitive analysis of the factors that shape the human mind, Kagan explores the tension between biology and the environment. He reviews major advances in the science of development over the past three decades and offers pointed critiques and new syntheses. In so doing, Kagan calls out the shortcomings of the modern fad for neuroscience, shows why theories of so-called attachment parenting are based on a misinterpretation of research, and questions the field's reflexive tendency to pathologize the behavior of the young. Most importantly, he reminds us that a life, however influenced by biology and upbringing, is still a tapestry to be woven, not an outcome to be endured. A profound exploration of what is universal and what is individual in human development, The Human Spark is the result of a scientist's lifelong quest to discover how we become who we are. Whether the reader is a first-time parent wondering what influence she, her genes, and the wider world will have on her child; an educator seeking insight into the development of her students; or simply a curious soul seeking self-knowledge, Kagan makes an expert and companionable guide.

Toxicology and Human Environments

Toxicology and Human Environments
Author: Ernest Hodgson
Publisher: Academic Press
Total Pages: 452
Release: 2012-09-28
Genre: Medical
ISBN: 0124158137

Environmental toxicology is generally held to be the study of the potential of constituents of outdoor environments to impact either human health or the biological structure of the ecosystems involved. This volume is a first attempt to integrate toxicological studies of all of the many human environments, both indoor and outdoor, and their complex interrelationships. Included are considerations of natural environments, the agroecosystem, occupational, urban and domestic environments as well as the environment associated with Superfund sites and military deployments. The primary emphasis is on public health, including the potential health effects of toxicants found in different environments, the bioprocessing of such toxicants in humans and surrogate animals and the principles of risk analysis. Approaches the toxicology of human environments in a new and unique way, stressing the complex interrelationships of all human environments and the implication for human and environmental health Each chapter is written by an acknowledged expert and is addressed to those interested in the broader implications of the environmental modifications that are always associated with the activities of humans living and working in them