The higher the level of cooperation, the higher the level of intelligence

From The Intelligence Paradox by Steve Davis. The substance of Davis's argument is:

The great Russian geographer Peter Kropotkin made the important point in Mutual Aid – A Factor in Evolution, that as a general rule the most social animals are the most intelligent animals. An observed increase in sociality generally goes hand in hand with an observable increase in intelligence. What is sociality but cooperation? The higher the level of cooperation, the higher the level of intelligence.

But differing levels of cooperation/intelligence are not just seen between species. Cooperation becomes more complex and advanced as we move from cell to organism to community, and intelligence follows exactly the same pattern on that pathway also.

The correlation between cooperation and intelligence is so close and so consistent, that for all practical purposes we can assume that they are the same concept. Intelligence is cooperation.

I'll have to mull on that a bit. Seems like there might be a couple of weak links in the logic. However, accepting the argument on the face of it, it would explain the Flynn effect. Society has been becoming socially, technologically, and systemically much more complex, particularly in the OECD, for the past hundred years, and probably at an accelerating rate. This increasing complexity requires increasing cooperation and if cooperation is intelligence, one would expect to see increasing IQs, exactly what Flynn has documented. The corollary would be that one would expect that those involved in the most complex and dynamic environments requiring the greatest degree of cooperation would show both the highest IQ as well as the greatest increases. Interesting to consider.

So I am guessing that one would expect to see material increases in generational IQs in families that have continued to sustain a presence in the top quintile of earned income, making the assumption that the level of required cooperation increase has been the greatest at the most innovative, dynamic and remunerative end of the economy. I.e. Lawyers, doctors, accountants, academics, scientists in 1900 were at the top of their income pyramid as they are at the top of the income pyramid today but that owing to increasing complexity in all these fields, the degree of cooperation required to stay at the top is much greater today than it might have been in 1900 and therefore, accepting the premise that intelligence is cooperation, the IQ of top legal (accounting, medical, etc.) practitioners today would be materially greater than that of those in 1900.

Hmm.