Science: Superior Birth Rate

Utah ranks first, Louisiana last, in the number of “superior” persons born in the state in proportion to the total population. So concluded Columbia University’s famed, retired professor of educational psychology, Edward Lee Thorndike, in the current Scientific Monthly. Using listings in Who’s Who, American Men of Science and Leaders in Education as evidence of superiority, he based his calculations on the state populations between 1870 and 1900.

The New England states rank high on Dr. Thorndike’s list. So does a block of five Western states—Idaho, Colorado, North and South Dakota, Wyoming (and Utah). But the ten states that are lowest are all Southern.