Your points are accurate but the discussion has moved into the weeds. The people of the major Asian countries have been literate and using engineering for well over two thousand years and that was my point. This discussion is about the influence of genes on the issues brought up by Brooks in his column. The bottom line is that groups of people whose ancestors were advanced and literate for thousands of years are in the first world today regardless of race or ethnicity while groups of people recently emerged from the Stone Age do not fare as well. The twin studies clearly show there is a genetic component to intelligence and behavior. But I leave any further interpretation to others because it quickly becomes an uncomfortable discussion.