PREFACE IX
ants to humans, and, fi nally, that transformative evolution to human cul-
ture and social cognition. Th ey are nothing if not far reaching. Imagine
that genes are not the “blueprints” or “ recipes” we have been told they are;
that living things existed before genes; that a child’s potential is not pre-
limited, but is created in the course of development; that the environment
is vastly more complex— yet more providential— than it looks; that forms
of “intelligence” exist even in single cells; that the brain and human intel-
ligence develop throughout life; that, in humans, they are shaped by the
“social tools” they have access to rather than innate programs.
Above all, imagine that, far from the gene- based ladder- view of people
with graded brains, the vast majority of us, and our children, will be con-
stitutionally “good enough” for participation at all levels of social activ-
ity and demo cratic institutions. Th is is the view that the new biology and
psy chol ogy, and even many experts in human resources, in commerce
and industry, are coming around to. It might just be bringing humans out
of a long period of ideological gloom in which only the few are really
“bright,” into a new enlightenment for every one. It all suggests a far better,
more hopeful, story to be told about human potential.
Th at is the story to be told in this book, but it involves a long route
through much novel territory. To give you some sense of direction,
here is a rough route map. In the fi rst chapter, I explain why a new look
at the whole fi eld covered by the title is badly needed. I illustrate how
ideology has (even unwittingly) perfused much of what passes for a
science of potential through a key weakness— the vagueness of its basic
concepts. Th e rest of the chapter illustrates, at some length, such weak-
ness in the recent hype- ridden “advances” about genes and brains and
intelligence.
What follows deconstructs the current edifi ce around those basic
concepts— and then slowly builds a new one on sounder foundations.
Chapter 2 is about the peculiar, and largely mythical, model of the gene
at the roots of the edifi ce; it exposes the fl awed methods of inquiry (and
results) developed around it. Chapter 3 shows how the IQ test— the basis
of nearly all that is said about genes, brains, and intelligence—is the op-
posite of an objective mea sure. Th ere is no agreed-on theory of intelli-
gence: test constructors have simply deci ded in advance who is more or
less “intelligent” and then built the test around that decision.
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