A Nuclear Power Plant for Nigeria? What a Wonderful World . . .

Nigeria's Federal Government is set to sign an agreement with the Russian Federation for the building of Nigeria's first nuclear power plant. Nigeria is an oil-rich African nation which is looking to diversify its sources of energy and electrical power. Nigeria has been seeking help from Russia for some time in this regard, and Nigeria's leaders are somewhat unhappy with Russia's slow response to their requests.

Modern nuclear power plants are quite safe when properly designed, built, and operated. In Japan's recent deadly natural disaster, well over 20,000 Japanese people lost their lives from a massive earthquake and tsunami, but none died as a result of a serious nuclear power plant shutdown and partial core meltdown. When such rare and unexpected events occur, the right people to cope with the situation must be on hand.

The chart on top shows the IQ distribution curves for four fuzzily defined racial groups: Asian, White, Hispanic, and Black. These curves are approximations based upon the best scientific evidence available. The second chart above shows a global IQ map by nation, again using the best available scientific evidence to produce the chart. In both charts it is clear that blacks and Africans lag behind all other "races" and nations tested. Why is this important in regard to a nuclear power plant in Nigeria? Look at the chart below:

This chart describes the IQ requirements for different types of professions, occupations, and vocations. If a population's IQ mean and IQ distribution curve provides an inadequate number of persons bright enough to become qualified engineers, technicians, scientists, etc, that population on its own will find it very difficult to maintain a high technology infrastructure. In terms of nuclear power plants, the personnel requirements are particularly critical in the cases where things go wrong.

It has been argued that Africans score poorly on IQ test for reasons having nothing to do with underlying intelligence. It is very important to test this hypothesis using the very best scientific tools available. If black and African populations have been judged unfairly in this regard, it is of utmost importance that this injustice be corrected.

Unfortunately, modern politically correct culture only wants to sweep the issue under the rug, and deny its importance entirely -- without performing the proper scientific experiments. That would be most unwise in this age of rapid scientific and technological progress -- when the mishandling of modern technologies could lead to tens or hundreds of thousands of unnecessary deaths, and other lingering problems.

This series of blog postings from "Race, Genes, and Disparity," discusses a way in which this uncertainty could be settled fairly and scientifically. Objective criteria for testing should be devised and implemented, so that modern societies can face important issues with the information that they need.

The enhancing of human intelligence is becoming a critically important issue for all societies. Nigeria has recently made the cognitive enhancer Vinpocetine available to Nigerians in an effort to bring the "national IQ" up to global standards. Other, more effective methods of increasing IQ are likely to come along in the near future. Even if western nations do not approve such therapies for use by normal persons, it is likely that nations of the third world and emerging world (BRICS etc) will have no such qualms about their use.

Whether the Russians build a nuclear power plant for Nigeria, is up to the Russians and the Nigerians. One might ask whether the Nigerian government will be willing to pay Russian engineers, technicians, electricians, welders, turbine specialists, etc to maintain the power plant indefinitely? If not, who will be minding the nuclear power plant?

The same issue is likely to emerge in other African nations, attempting agreements with Russia, China, India, etc. for the building of advanced technologies which require elite scientific and technological oversight. If the African nation is willing and able to pay for the technology, what business is it to outsiders -- as long as the technology being sold is not nuclear technology or other technology of mass death?

Africa is littered with crumbling and rusting technological projects built by colonial powers and outside interests. They are rusting and crumbling because they were not maintained. The neglect of proper maintenance is typical of the third world environment, and besides suggesting a low cognitive complement, the phenomena of widespread neglect also suggests a low executive function (EF) complement. Low IQ and Low EF: Not a promising combination for the wise development of potentially deadly technologies. Think about it.