Sorry, Dad. You may be responsible for your son's big nose, but all the credit for the kid's genius goes to Mom.
That, at least, is the latest thinking in genetics laboratories. Boys inherit their intelligence from their mothers, according to Gillian Turner, an Australian geneticist. She cites growing evidence that several genes for intelligence are located on the X chromosome, which men inherit only from their mothers (along with a tiny Y from their fathers). Women, in contrast, receive an X chromosome from each parent so they can theoretically inherit their father's intelligence.
There are many genes that influence intelligence, and if some are found on the X chromosome but others are found on different chromosomes, a son's intelligence will be more highly correlated to his mother's IQ than his father's, but still be correlated to the IQ of both parents.
It does seem to me that the IQs of fathers is positively correlated to those of their sons.
