Thanks for your considered reply. I'll check those references, when I have access to a copy of the book.
Why would you think that a book called "The g Factor: The Science of Mental Ability" would only be about heritability?
Because I read all the reviews on the amazon page, and that is all they talked about. Not having a copy, that's the best I could do - and that is why I said it "doesn't seem to". You're putting words in my mouth.
Perhaps the greatest source of survival ability in human beings is the ability to co-operate. General capability, in the sense of "g", of course contributes not only to individual capability, but also to this ability to cooperate. It seems though, that a preoccupation with "g" itself can become an instrument of division between people (and peoples), and ironically this preoccupation therefore reduces its possessor's survival ability.
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Yes. Why do you ask?
Because I find that my life is better, and I make a better contribution to the people around me, when I am aware of the things that we do have influence over, instead of the things we don't. Some aspects of mental ability seem to fall into the first category. I asked you, because you seemed to know something about it.
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When found by the auothorities, at age six,
I said "that the speech centers do not develop unless exposed to speech within the window (closes at around 7yo )."
There have been only few documented cases of severely neglected children. In those cases where child was rescued before age 7, they recover; but in those cases where the child was rescued after ago 7, they did not recover. With so few cases (thankfully), it's hard to be accurate - but the window seems to be about 7yo, from the data. This was from Psych 101, and sorry I don't have references on hand - it was almost 20 years ago - but any first year text should have it. Note that the opposite story of Isabelle ("neglected child/adult found with retarded mental abilities; never recovers") will be much less reported in the mainstream press and have a lower pagerank. Quite possibly, new data has been uncovered since then (though hopefully not), which could well invalidate the above hypothesis - but the particular case of Isabelle does not. Again, you have not taken into account what I have written - in this case "closes at around 7yo".
Incidentally, Isabelle demonstrates that before stimulus was available, the mental abilities were not present - only the potential for those abilities. Without appropriate mental stimulation, our potential is not realized.
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You seem pretty arrogant in your rhetorical questions, so I'm going to leave you to it at this point. Thanks for the references, and good luck to you. :-)