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I think the memo made two mistakes here. The first, from my perspective, is that it crossed a line that you really have to tread with care when it started talk

I think the memo made two mistakes here. The first, from my perspective, is that it crossed a line that you really have to tread with care when it started talking about "biological IQ". Anyone familiar with the sordid history of eugenics knows that you tread that line really carefully, both because of the sordid history of policy on that sort of thing, the extreme difficulty of separating biological vs. environmental constructs for IQ, and the difficulty of creating a single "IQ test" that measures every single aspect of human intelligence. The quote about "IQ and sex differences" (being something the left ignored) was only supported by a link to conservative think tank Manhattan Institute for Policy Research (which said some things about bias in science grants, but didn't really have anything to say about IQ and sex differences). This is the point where, to me, the memo went downhill. I am not sure it is the intention (possibly the emphasis was intended to be more the politic), but it is very easy to infer inferior / superior claims at this point, because the whole "IQ and sex differences" thing sort of came out of nowhere. The other reason it went downhill fast, and unnecessarily so, was because the paper brought in "liberal" vs "conservative" American political dynamics elements. BIG mistake. Any discussion along this line needs to be as apolitical as possible, lest it descend rapidly into toxic left-wing vs. right-wing tribalism territory (as, well, happened). Instead of attempting to skirt around politics, loaded phrases were used, particularly at the end of the memo, like "PC authoritarian", and sourced links typically were op-ed, often with strong bias. I agree that a lot of the memo is more some of the tribal / "role" paradigms and elements that have been discussed in many sources over time, and there's actually some interesting food for thought in it. I'm not terribly comfortable that what I see as poor communication skills led to the firing. I would not characterize this memo as "polite" though, for the above reasons.

threatofrain 9y ago
I would argue that IQ tests don't measure every single aspect of human intelligence, it's interested in one specific construct, if it exists -- g, which stands for a general capability. IQ is a test made for humans, but the concept of g is far more general than humans, and applies to machines as well. When Google's AlphaGo beat some famous champions, people were wondering whether Google's program was merely a Go-specific program, or a more general program that learned to play Go. I would also argue that if you went out and created another test for IQ, it would likely have high iter-rater reliability with IQ, but maybe have rough edges and have less empirical attention than mainstream tests like Ravens Matrices. That has been the history of people trying to make a name for themselves by making another intelligence construct, only to find it has insufficient distinction from IQ.
orisa2 9y ago
I'd also suggest that another factor is that the author assumed that his reader base would have basic statistical knowledge, which I'd suggest would not be true even among software engineers. Just erase any reference to distributions or averages and you'll see what most people see. This just adds to your points.
appleflaxen 9y ago
this was a fantastic critique. very well-reasoned; thank you.
imron 9y ago
> is that it crossed a line that you really have to tread with care when it started talking about "biological IQ". He mentioned this only briefly (a bracketed clause 5 words long) as an example of science that the left ignores, because there does appear to be a difference in IQ between biological sexes [0], with current research suggesting the averages are similar, however there is a higher variation among males, leading to a higher proportion of men at the very high and very low ends of the spectrum. His comments on this were in no way used to infer one group was superior or more intelligent than the other. He was just pointing out that the left will ignore or deny science when it conflicts with ideology. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligence#Current_research_on_general_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligenc...

threatofrain 9y ago

I would argue that IQ tests don't measure every single aspect of human intelligence, it's interested in one specific construct, if it exists -- g, which stands for a general capability. IQ is a test made for humans, but the concept of g is far more general than humans, and applies to machines as well. When Google's AlphaGo beat some famous champions, people were wondering whether Google's program was merely a Go-specific program, or a more general program that learned to play Go. I would also argue that if you went out and created another test for IQ, it would likely have high iter-rater reliability with IQ, but maybe have rough edges and have less empirical attention than mainstream tests like Ravens Matrices. That has been the history of people trying to make a name for themselves by making another intelligence construct, only to find it has insufficient distinction from IQ.

orisa2 9y ago

I'd also suggest that another factor is that the author assumed that his reader base would have basic statistical knowledge, which I'd suggest would not be true even among software engineers. Just erase any reference to distributions or averages and you'll see what most people see. This just adds to your points.

appleflaxen 9y ago

this was a fantastic critique. very well-reasoned; thank you.

imron 9y ago

> is that it crossed a line that you really have to tread with care when it started talking about "biological IQ". He mentioned this only briefly (a bracketed clause 5 words long) as an example of science that the left ignores, because there does appear to be a difference in IQ between biological sexes [0], with current research suggesting the averages are similar, however there is a higher variation among males, leading to a higher proportion of men at the very high and very low ends of the spectrum. His comments on this were in no way used to infer one group was superior or more intelligent than the other. He was just pointing out that the left will ignore or deny science when it conflicts with ideology. 0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligence#Current_research_on_general_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sex_differences_in_intelligenc...