ABSTRACT
We will not attempt to psychoanalyze the life and work of Lewis Terman, but we will endeavor to trace his life, from his Indiana farm roots through his career, chronicling a variety topics, some of which might easily be excerpts from the tables of contents of psychology’s journals at the beginning of the 21st century-the contributions of nature and nurture to intelligence, fairness in testing, sex differences in ability, and the constancy of the IQ. Charting such a course presents a challenge. As Terman himself observed, one’s knowledge of the final outcome almost certainly biases the moments chosen as significant in one’s past: “Memory of a given period of one’s life is selective; what finally survives is determined partly by the nature of the events which follow” (1961, p. 297). We proceed, then, with an awareness of the biases inherent in examining a life with the benefit of hindsight.
