>>125479561) Asians IQ scores are higher, but I don't think this is due to 'higher g'.
2) personality matters as well. Europeans are globally incredibly individualist - meaning slightly mad scientists dont get their head cut off. Europeans have much lower conformity
3) i'd narrow down from europeans actually. Really its south east england and north west europe that has contributed most. an even narrower band of harsh but predictable ecologies from the years 400- 1700.
4) Other cultural considerations play a role. eg the invention of the joint stock corporation as a means of stacking the expertise gained in certain areas. (smart companies vertically integrate). I think this counts for 10% of the variance in speed and success of industrialization- eg of britain compared to italy. Legislating a common market area in england was a huge advance (copied in netherlands and france) and such things often lead to fast technological advancement of populations that never quite industrialised by themselves but were intilligent enough to maintain industrial society (Japan, Korea, india to a lesser extent, middle eastern states like saudi, iraq, the tiger economies, vietnam...).