fully formed bird), so there is still no evidence that any one race or type of human is particularly superior to another.
Perhaps the most important part of Gould's book is chapter 6, "The Real Error of Cyril Burt: Factor Analysis and the Reification of Intelligence" (234-320). In this chapter Gould explains the mathematics behind Burt's use of factor analysis to reduce complex factors to fewer and therefore simpler factors which are more easily grasped and summarized. Gould first explains how Burt actually obtained his ideas from Charles Spearman (237-239). Math has always impressed people, and complex math only more so. The math itself is a valid statistical practice, but the use it was put to was heinous. Gould then explains how factor analysis essentially throws out certain variables in the interest of comprehension.
The first problem is that these variables are what make a person unique. By reducing the test of a person to numbers that can be compared to other people, the tester is reducing the person himself to an entity that is valid only insofar as he or she can be compared to other people, favorably or unfavorably. The second problem is that factor analysis then leaves to the tester the decision of which qualities shall be factored into the analysis and which other qualities shall be left out because they are not "important." In other words, the whole of psychological testing presupposes the superior value of intelligence, and so only tests for intelligence, not compassion or loyalty.
Gould describes how the many faceted and vague quality of intelligence was "reified" (from Latin "res", meaning "thing," 24) and then made into a thing by Spearman and Burt which they then could study. This thing Spearman divided into "g" for general intelligence and "s" for specific intelligence (257). Men such as Lambroso developed atavism to explain how the quality of intelligence could be made the thing from which derive other t...