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>While skilled, I doubt than more than a small fraction of FB work force is close to Feynman's IQ. Feynman is semi-famous for testing at a much lower IQ than m

>While skilled, I doubt than more than a small fraction of FB work force is close to Feynman's IQ. Feynman is semi-famous for testing at a much lower IQ than most people assume. (He scored 125 on his test at school). See: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/finding-the-next-einstein/201112/polymath-physicist-richard-feynmans-low-iq-and-finding-another https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/finding-the-next-ein...

luckydude 9y ago
Unless I'm mistaken, I tested out at 140 a long time ago. There is no friggin way I'm remotely as intelligent as Feynman was so there goes any faith in IQ tests being meaningful. Most of the people who have worked for me are demonstrably smarter than me and none of them are close to Feynman. Smart people but not at his level IMO. RIP IQ tests :)
- droidist2 9y ago
  Doesn't it depend a lot on what age you take the test though? Like I was very smart for my age as a child and I tested very high. Later in life I'm probably not much higher than my peers.
  - mmrezaie 9y ago
    I think the whole point of IQ test is being stable independent of age.
    - droidist2 9y ago
      Originally though IQ was calculated by dividing by age, now it's calculated by comparing with those in the same age group. So any random child outscoring a famous scientist doesn't seem to be that significant.
    - JoshMnem 9y ago
      It seems like a goal of IQ is to assign a single, unchanging score to someone's cognitive ability, but it is a severely flawed concept. The test should not be called "intelligence quotient" but something like "cognitive battery" instead. You don't have an IQ. It's a test that you take that can provide some useful information, but it isn't a fixed score, and "intelligence" (a word that is too ambiguous to use without careful definition) can't be reduced to a single number.
      - Natsu 9y ago
        There's a difference as it were between, roughly speaking, stored knowledge and being able to figure things out on the fly, but multi-factor analysis says there's only one factor for being good at IQ tests, oddly enough. And every test of doing mental tasks we know how to create correlates strongly with any other test. There's a good explanation about how the tests work here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfg0hfrQMFM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfg0hfrQMFM
        JoshMnem 9y ago
        I'm not saying that the tests are useless, just that they should be renamed, and culture should look at them a little differently.
        Natsu 9y ago
        I would agree with you if you're saying that they're not at all a measure of human worth. I don't get the 'rename' comment, though. If we don't call one's skill at mental tasks 'intelligence', just how should we label it?
        JoshMnem 9y ago
        "Intelligence" is poorly defined in most conversations. The nature of the word and concepts around it lead to problems, even for people who can score high on IQ tests. It will take me a long time to write out my thoughts completely, but I plan to do it at some point.
  - luckydude 9y ago
    I think I tested around 30 (apparently still insecure enough back then to care, these days I care what my dogs think more than I care what people think :)
- aetherson 9y ago
  Tests can be sometimes inaccurate but still useful. There are false positive and negative rates for everything.
Lewton 9y ago
Feynman had a higher IQ than 125 Tests are not perfect, he could have had a bad day Maybe he didn’t care Maybe he misremembers taking an actual IQ test etc
na85 9y ago
IQ tests only measure your ability to write IQ tests.

luckydude 9y ago

Unless I'm mistaken, I tested out at 140 a long time ago. There is no friggin way I'm remotely as intelligent as Feynman was so there goes any faith in IQ tests being meaningful. Most of the people who have worked for me are demonstrably smarter than me and none of them are close to Feynman. Smart people but not at his level IMO. RIP IQ tests :)

droidist2 9y ago
Doesn't it depend a lot on what age you take the test though? Like I was very smart for my age as a child and I tested very high. Later in life I'm probably not much higher than my peers.
- mmrezaie 9y ago
  I think the whole point of IQ test is being stable independent of age.
  - droidist2 9y ago
    Originally though IQ was calculated by dividing by age, now it's calculated by comparing with those in the same age group. So any random child outscoring a famous scientist doesn't seem to be that significant.
  - JoshMnem 9y ago
    It seems like a goal of IQ is to assign a single, unchanging score to someone's cognitive ability, but it is a severely flawed concept. The test should not be called "intelligence quotient" but something like "cognitive battery" instead. You don't have an IQ. It's a test that you take that can provide some useful information, but it isn't a fixed score, and "intelligence" (a word that is too ambiguous to use without careful definition) can't be reduced to a single number.
    - Natsu 9y ago
      There's a difference as it were between, roughly speaking, stored knowledge and being able to figure things out on the fly, but multi-factor analysis says there's only one factor for being good at IQ tests, oddly enough. And every test of doing mental tasks we know how to create correlates strongly with any other test. There's a good explanation about how the tests work here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfg0hfrQMFM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nfg0hfrQMFM
      - JoshMnem 9y ago
        I'm not saying that the tests are useless, just that they should be renamed, and culture should look at them a little differently.
        Natsu 9y ago
        I would agree with you if you're saying that they're not at all a measure of human worth. I don't get the 'rename' comment, though. If we don't call one's skill at mental tasks 'intelligence', just how should we label it?
        JoshMnem 9y ago
        "Intelligence" is poorly defined in most conversations. The nature of the word and concepts around it lead to problems, even for people who can score high on IQ tests. It will take me a long time to write out my thoughts completely, but I plan to do it at some point.
- luckydude 9y ago
  I think I tested around 30 (apparently still insecure enough back then to care, these days I care what my dogs think more than I care what people think :)
aetherson 9y ago
Tests can be sometimes inaccurate but still useful. There are false positive and negative rates for everything.

Lewton 9y ago

Feynman had a higher IQ than 125 Tests are not perfect, he could have had a bad day Maybe he didn’t care Maybe he misremembers taking an actual IQ test etc

na85 9y ago

IQ tests only measure your ability to write IQ tests.