Genes, Brains, and Human Potential The Science and Ideology of Intelligence

6 PINNING DOWN POTENTIAL

Chapters 2 and 3 attempt to lift the fog around those (incredibly perva-

sive) ideas. Th e rest of the book will pres ent the steps to the new way of

thinking.

THE USEFULNESS OF OBSCURITY

Th e popu lar concept of human potential is, in fact, the perfect vehicle for
turning ideology into science. Th e terminology that abounds today— such
as “genes for” or “brain networks related to”— can make conclusions about
potential sound quite convincing. But the scientifi c defi nitions of “poten-
tial” are no clearer than those of a standard dictionary: a “something”
capable of becoming “something else,” a “capacity” for developing into
something, the “possibility” of being or becoming, a “latent” quality, and
so on.
It is precisely that ambiguity that makes the concept of human poten-
tial so prone to ideological infi ll and po liti cal rhe toric. It subtly weaves
hope and fatalism into our unequal socie ties. It suggests that each of us
might become more than we are now; but also that nature— the luck of
the ge ne tic dice— ensures there will be strict limits to it. Th e concept, in
other words, is an ideological con ve nience that perfectly maintains the
notion of innate diff erences and limits while framing the con temporary
rhe toric about “equal opportunities” and “fulfi lling our children’s poten-
tial.” Th is is refl ected in the very concepts of intelligence, of the gene, and
of the brain. A quick look should illustrate the point.

THE “g” PHANTOM

Th e con temporary scientifi c concept of intelligence is an off spring of that
con ve nient vagueness: a hunch— something “obvious”— clothed in the
precise language of science but with a murkier history.
Although Charles Darwin considered himself to be “rather below the
common intelligence” (and had an undistinguished school and univer-
sity career), he revealed to us the role of biological variation in heredity
and evolution. His cousin, Francis Galton, who had inherited a fortune,

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