Most of my friends are Asian. Not because I am racially biased toward Asians (and I'm White anyway), but because they make up most of my classmates.
30% or less in my town (which is a mostly White town), but almost 100% of my classmates. The joys of advanced classes.
To get this out of the way - I very much doubt there is a genetic advantage they have. Those ideas died with Hitler, so just no.
I have a number of White friends, whom I find to be just as smart. That's kind of who I hang out with - smart people. So I occasionally look around the room and think to wonder why there aren't more Whites present.
In short - why are Asians smart?
They do better on the SAT, make up disproportionate amounts of high-end colleges, and are the only minority to have entered the U.S. and kicked ass. Asians are on the level with Whites for income, while Blacks, Hispanics, etc. are still considerably lower.
I've asked around, and I've gotten a couple fun answers.
1. It's a cultural thing. Asians' culture places greater emphasis on education.
2. Since many are the children of immigrants, the influence of the immigrants is still direct. And who immigrates to the U.S.? People who want a better life (combined with the intelligence to get enough money to do it). This also encapsulates the "I didn't immigrate here so you could sit on your ass, now study!" reasoning. AKA parental pressure.
So I give the question to you (and I do want answers on this):
Why? Why Asians?
My answer, I would say is the first one that you have, but I will say a bit more.
I feel that asians of all people, fault throughout history in a brutal way, too the point where they had to train themsevles to be wiser and more patient then the enemy. Being patient, lowers stress levels, which allows you to open your mind to what can be done, and not just the answers that you may just have sitting around in your brain. Like for example....in a fight, someone attempts to strike me in a way that I've never seen, but I automatically block it because my mind is ready to anything. Now, say that my mind is not, and I only know certain things, and my mind stays closed to only those things....well, im probably about to get killed, because I did not train myself to be open enough.
So basically, it's not actually because they are Asians, but it is because their minds are opened well enough to be able to gain access to that of which they feel they need to survive, and well, an education is...what most indians and asians come here for, so they can do something other than fight, like their people had to do.
Because we Asians really kick ass.
Actually, you should see how we spent our childhood. Not a pretty picture.
**Should we split U.S. in two?
Maybe Asians are not as proud of their heritage as some people are. Maybe someone made them feel ashamed for being Asian. Maybe it's the dog eat dog world they imigrate from. Maybe it's bad attitudes they encounter on their daily rounds. It's either that, or guilt. I don't have a clue at this point.....LOL
I very much doubt there is a genetic advantage they have.
Why are you so quick to discount this possibility?
I don't doubt that hardwork, culture and family have a lot to do with whether or not people succeed academically or in any other way. I agree that Asians have an advantage in this respect. Another group that has "kicked ass" is the Jewish people. They are over-represented as a percentage in top schools, and high level positions in business and government. But plenty of people work really hard. It takes more than that to climb to the top.
Some people are clearly born with more raw intelligence than others. They seem to be able to get A's in school and solve complex analytical problems without effort while others struggle to achieve the same results. These people have a genetic gift. That does not make them better or worse than anybody else, just a little different. They may be brilliant but in other ways they may have genetic challenges. Google Steve Hawkins for an example.
That's kind of who I hang out with - smart people.
As you observe in your own behavior, smart people often are attracted to each other. This applies to both friendship and romance. It may be fun to date a bimbo but the thought of spending a lifetime with one can only seem good to another bimbo. Being a smart person I presume you understand that when two people with similar genetic characteristics have offspring, that the odds that their children will share these genetic characteristics with their parents become much higher. When one thinks about the averages, smart people have smart children and dumb people have dumb children.
The Chinese have had a 5000 year civilization. During much of that time the country was run by a bureacracy that required extremely rigorous entrance exams to enter the civil service which was the best route to success. It was a meritocracy that both selected for intelligence and encouraged the culture of valuing education and hard work that has been mentioned in many of the previous posts. It is not surprising to me that the Chinese people encouraged their children to select mates at least partially on the basis or their intelligence. When isolated populations start self selecting for certain characteristics, those characteristics get amplified in the population.
There are plenty of stupid Asians and plenty of smart whites, blacks and hispanics. But I find it entirely believable that when we start talking about averages for the respective populations, we would find that Asians and Jews had an IQ advantage over other groups. Some people might find that offensive but I have a hard time finding a scientific hypothesis offensive. It can be tested and proved or disproved with scientific methods. Its too bad that political correctness makes this kind of research all but impossible to conduct. It harkens back to the persecution of scienctists like Newton and Galileo by the Catholic Church. It's ignorant.
Coming from a family that wants to get ahead [European] and wants mostly good grades [Asian], it's mostly and almost all culture.
If I talk to my mom about getting bad grades in math, what does she do? "Study more! You don't study enough!" Then if I talk to my dad? "Keep studying and try your best."
Asian parent[s] are harsh when it comes to studying. They [usually] really want to see you exceed, haha.