IQ: A Smart History of a Failed Idea

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Advance praise for

IQ A Smart History of a Failed Idea

""An up-to-date, reader-friendly account of the continuing saga of the mismeasure of women and men.""
--Howard Gardner, author of Frames of Mind and Multiple Intelligences: New Horizons

""The good news is that you won't be tested after you've read Stephen Murdoch's important new book. The better news is that IQ: A Smart History of a Failed Idea is compelling from its first pages, and by its conclusion, Murdoch has deftly demonstrated that in our zeal to quantify intelligence, we have needlessly scarred--if not destroyed--the lives of millions of people who did not need an IQ score to prove their worth in the world. IQ is first-rate narrative journalism, a book that I hope leads to necessary change.""
--Russell Martin, author of Beethoven's Hair, Picasso's War, and Out of Silence

""With fast-paced storytelling, freelance journalist Murdoch traces now ubiquitous but still controversial attempts to measure intelligence to its origins in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. . . . Murdoch concludes that IQ testing provides neither a reliable nor a helpful tool in understanding people's behavior, nor can it predict their future success or failure. . . . A thoughtful overview and a welcome reminder of the dangers of relying on such standardized tests.""
--Publishers Weekly

""Stephen Murdoch delivers a lucid and engaging chronicle of the ubiquitous and sometimes insidious use of IQ tests. This is a fresh look at a century-old and still controversial idea--that our human potential can be distilled down to a single test score. Murdoch's compelling account demands a reexamination of our mania for mental measurement.""
--Paul A. Lombardo, author of Three Generations, No Imbeciles: Eugenics, the Supreme Court & Buck v. Bell.