It may be true that they have a lower IQ, but they are cooler than non-smokers. FACT.
All the atricle is really saying is that people with lower IQs are more prone to start smoking. It doesn't mean that people with high IQs won't or don't smoke or that there is a direct correlation between smoking and intelligence (or lack thereof), the article just implies that through its pretentious tone. Obama was/is a smoker. A fact that several anti-smoking liberals tend to conveniently downplay... Does that mean he has a low IQ?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X9LcNyn614I&feature=related
Here's an interesting study about smoking cigarettes and IQs
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/02/23/eline/links/20100223elin001.html
...
Last Updated: 2010-02-23 10:00:43 -0400 (Reuters Health)
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Researchers at Sheba Medical Center have demonstrated that cigarette smokers have a more difficult time understanding the significance of statistical health studies than non-smokers. It quickly became apparent that the more a person smokes the more difficulties they experienced.
When shown two highly correlated factors, young men who smoked a pack of cigarettes a day believed those factors to imply a causal relationship that did not exist.
This was true even in cases where the studies clarified this point in the conclusion.
Men who smoked more than a pack of cigarettes a day believed that if they could find one to two examples that did not fit the correlation, then the correlation must not hold.
They held this belief even when the examples chosen were neither from the sample nor subject to any of the same controls.
Nearly all smokers were found to reject studies or data of any kind that conflicted with their desire to continue to smoke in the quantities and frequencies desired.
The findings suggest to Weiser and his team that people addicted to nicotine become resistant to studies suggesting negative effects of smoking, rather than that smoking made those people less intelligent and thus unable to comprehend health studies.
SOURCE: Addiction, February 2010.
Interesting article.
Apparently the same team performed another related study...
http://www.reutershealth.com/archive/2010/02/23/eline/links/20100223elin001wtf.html
LiES!
I think the study says that in the Israeli military more dumb soldiers smoke than smart soldiers. Smoking did not contribute to anyone's genius (ex. Einstein, JFK, whomever). Soldiers may have a reason to smoke: calm nerves. But, it is a dumb way to calm nerves.
The social acceptance of smoking no longer exists. It causes cancer in most people who smoke.
Fire on one end, a fool on the other end!