The IQ Scores of Nazi Leaders According to The Nuremberg Trials
Were some of history’s most evil men dummies or geniuses?
One of the least remembered parts of the Nuremberg Trials was the fact that the most prominent Nazi leaders put on trial were subjected to a bevy of personality and IQ tests. One of the goals of the Nuremberg Trial was to figure out why these people would commit such heinous acts. At this point, the Allies were convinced that many of these men were guilty of the crimes they were being accused of. The question then moved on to motive. Were the Nazis sociopaths? Were they psychopaths? Could their actions have been prevented? Were they suffering from some sort of mass psychosis? Did Nazism simply attract people with specific personality disorders?
These questions were a source of fascination within the psychology community for decades after the fact. The defense of “I was just following orders” was deconstructed, reconstructed, and deconstructed again.
One of the most interesting things to come out of these tests was the IQ scores of the surviving Nazi leaders. Were these men stupid? Were they brilliant? That was another thing that was being examined. Was the Holocaust and the course of the war driven by people of low IQs or high IQs? Which would be worse?
