Dear genners,

A JTA article gives more information on the topic and more
comments >from researchers and interested personalities.

http://www.jta.org/page_view_story.asp?intarticleid=15509&intcategoryid=5

(remember to copy and paste the entire URL into your browser)

While the study proposes that occupations "allowed" to Jews
during medieval times account for improved genetic mental
agility, those quoted in this updated story note that at the same
time the Christian majority were selecting against an
intelligence gene due to celibacy of priests and monks,
preventing the most learned >from reproducing, Jews, on the other
hand, with historical devotion to learning, believed that the
best marriage partners were intellectually advanced students.
Jews who were economically better off had more children who lived
longer and who tended to marry others in the same "class."
Combined with very low intermarriage until contemporary times,
this tended to concentrate both good (e.g. intelligence) and bad
(e.g. genetic disease) genes.

There is some interesting information on a Gaucher's clinic at
Shaare Zedek Hospital (Jerusalem) whose patients are in high-IQ
professions.

Schelly Talalay Dardashti
Tel Aviv
President, JFRA Israel
schelly@...