JAYMAN: Clannishness – the Series: Zigzag Lightning in the Brain.

Northwestern Europeans brought about the Scientific and Industrial Revolutions and continue to be at the forefront of discovery today. . . .

Why is this case? . . . As we’ve seen previously (e.g., Demography is Destiny, American Nations Edition), societal differences are driven by biological differences between people. . . .

Average IQ is part of the story, but far from all of it. Particularly, despite having roughly the same average IQ, Eastern Europeans and East Asians underperform relative to Northwestern Europeans (and their offshoots). This isn’t even entirely of matter of lack of “manpower”, as this map of the number of researchers per million shows . . .

Even among the Northwestern countries, the more Germanic countries stand ahead of the rest. Northwestern Europe, particularly the Germanic countries, have long been centers of development and progress. . . .

How did this penchant for abstraction come about among NW Europeans? I suspect that part of it has to do with the rise of high-trust and social atomization (i.e., individualism) in NW European societies. As clannishness disappeared, and as people were no longer bound to their families or clans (and indeed, we were free to interact with non-relative in cooperative ventures), people became more free to engage in intellectually stimulating thought. Mental space previously devoted understand one’s place in society and keep ahead of schemers now could be used on more abstract pursuits. Indeed, perhaps this was favored in the NW Euro way of life. I will discuss the evolution of NW Euro traits further in future entries in this series.