8 ms·

How Stifling Debate Around Race, Genes and IQ Can Do Harm (2018)

27 points by danielam 8y ago

_Schizotypy 8y ago
IQ is a shit measure of intelligence
- Proven 8y ago
  You're trying to stifle the debate by debating. Good luck with that.
- _Schizotypy 8y ago
  wow thanks for all the downvotes, apparently nobody is current on psychological research https://www.webmd.com/brain/news/20121218/iq-test-really-measure-intelligence#1 https://www.webmd.com/brain/news/20121218/iq-test-really-mea... https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/beautiful-minds/200910/intelligent-testing https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/beautiful-minds/2009...
- commandlinefan 8y ago
  Maybe, maybe not, but how would you know? As of now, IQ is the _only_ measure of intelligence, so there's nothing to compare it against except anecdotes. You can say, "so and so has a low IQ but he seems smart to me", but there's nothing objective to compare it against, so there's really no good way to tell if it does measure that ephemeral quality that we attribute to the term "intelligence". It does track pretty closely with every other objective measure of intelligence, though, like academic performance and financial success.
  - Junk_Collector 8y ago
    Of course if the IQ test was flawed and just a measure of where we expend resources on people rather than intelligence, it would strongly track with academic performance and financial success.
  - _Schizotypy 8y ago
    Just because something is the only game in town doesn't mean you should use it, that logic doesn't make sense. We need to work on developing better systems rather than saying "oh well, it's the only thing we've got!"
    - candiodari 8y ago
      You don't understand. IQ isn't "the only game in town" because there aren't any other games, it's the only game in town because all other games were gradually unmasked to all be the "IQ game". IQ started out being one of about 5 measurements of people. Because of the age, one other measure was "nobility". Well, corrected for IQ, it turned out, that didn't matter. Same happened to many others. You can characterize and predict how humans will perform in many, many games with this single variable. It's the one that works best. So the current thinking is that there is only one measurement of intelligence. They all converge into a single one. It's called IQ because that was the first one that worked well enough, not because there's just one way to measure it. (Technically there is also age. Younger people are dumber than older ones up to a pretty high age. But that's the IQ game: age and "raw iq". Nothing else really matters in predicting if someone can succeed at something. IQ, the measure used, is corrected for age, so it should take that out. But a 10 year old with 100 IQ is, in absolute terms, dumber than a 20 year old with IQ 100) So your criticism is rather a lot beside the point. We have worked, a long and hard and often on developing better systems. We have just never actually succeeded in creating a truly different system (this of course is a "technically incorrect" statement. There are recent research results, there are ... blah blah blah ... there is no halfway decent reason to assume those research directions will lead to anything, but we're still trying. We've been doing that for >100 years, so the odds of the next big thing being in the pipeline right now is small). The basic observation behind IQ is that "all skills converge" (I would argue this has even been observed in machine learning). If you know one skill, whichever one it is, you become faster, better and quicker to learn almost any other skill. Not much, a little. In machine learning there are papers that point out that the ability to distinguish poodle races in pictures help with music composition. Not "much", but the key is what happens over time. It helps something like 2-5% (measured in time to learn a certain proficiency in music composition). The issue is what happens with kids when you give them new skills regularly over a 10 year period. Then they have 100 more skills, or 100 times 2% easier time to learn a new skill compared to someone who learned nothing. 100 times 2% easier ... is (1.02^100)-1, which is an enormous number (which is why IQ is an exponential score, not a linear one. Someone with 120 should be about double as smart as someone scoring 100. By which we mean that if you take a random intellectual skill, the odds of the person with 120 having some proficiency at that skill is about double that of the person with 100). To add insult to injury IQ compounds on itself. The higher your IQ, the easier it is to get it even higher. What people hate about IQ is the underlying theory clearly shows that human brains are designed to amplify differences in intelligence over time, not to minimize them. That is a clear and incontestable fact at this point. This is presumably also not a bad thing, or it would have been selected out. This also won't change because of any amount of changes occurring in psychology or the measurement of it. We can prevent ourselves from knowing about it, but we can't change it.
dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago
Any such debate is quickly flagged on HN. The authors call it 'sacred value'; I call it 'taboo'.
- ForHackernews 8y ago
  I don't trust the HN audience to have a sensible discussion on this topic. Too many armchair evolutionary "experts" and crypto-racists.
  - goldenkey 8y ago
    Forgive me, what is a crypto-racist?
    - perfmode 8y ago
      The best art is often inaccessible to the intellect.
    - ForHackernews 8y ago
      Assuming you're asking in good faith: a racist who pretends not to be a racist. They'll often show up asking "Why can't we just have a reasonable discussion about low IQs in the Sub-Saharan African phenotype?" and ready with a Gish gallop list of dubious studies. If this post stays up, I'm sure they'll make an appearance.
      - postingtoofast 8y ago
        I see. And as soon as someone says something you don't like you're able to tell that they've been pulling this act right? Like, your spidey sense starts tingling or something? That's a neat skill!
      - goldenkey 8y ago
        Isn't it pretty much proven that IQ is mostly determined by genetics, and that races like the Ashkenazi Jews are extremely above average compared to the rest of the world? Tell me - what is racist about this scientific fact: Black people are stronger and run faster (indubitably due to slavery / selective breeding.) Jews are smarter (most nobel prizes.) Races are different, sure. To say that smarter or stronger means superior, is racist. But before that, understanding of differences... that's just science. Since strength and smartness are both held by society as virtues, it's easy to look like a racist if you simply state science.
rjkennedy98 8y ago
I think the bigger debate is whether eugenics or anti-dysgenics should be a policy goal of the government. Whether we like it or not - if we don't pass our best genes down to our children we are hurting future generations. I suspect the fact that we've turned so against eugenics goes hand in hand with the fact that we've also destroyed the environment, the financial well-being, and even the mental health of the next generation (especially here in America).
- vmh1928 8y ago
  In my observation (completely unbiased, mind you,) brains come from the mother. Therefore it's vitally important for the future of the human race that smart women have children. Certainly the stupid ones are.
- throwawaymanbot 8y ago
  Laughably you are posting this opinion here? Its not for YOU (or your ilk) to pick winners in the "best genes" debate. What you deem to be "good genes" is a garbage hypothesis based on your own personal outlook and bias. Your own personal outlook and bias is not how nature works now should it. (Luckily for those who may not meet your genetic standards) I think the bigger debate is why you care about eugenics and don't have the courage to just say what you really feel, instead of dressing it up like failed Nazi policy is what America and the west needs right now. (if they could just man up and implement a eugenics policy to save us all)
- thebigspacefuck 8y ago
  We don't know what the best genes are or will be. Furthermore as humans we work together to overcome personal shortcomings and develop technological/medical solutions to overcome genetic "issues". ADHD or ASD can be a gift or a curse depending on the environment you live in. I find different cultures/religions to be quite interesting in their characteristics of families. Mormons seem to have larger families. They require 10% of income goes to the church which increases the church's influence, so the church gets stronger the more people are in it. It's like a self-sustaining organism that gets stronger with each generation. As an intelligent individual belonging to no particular culture or religion, I feel less inclined to have children than others I know since it's not part of my values. It's likely that people like myself are going to have a difficult time passing on our genetics. If you want to encourage smart people to have kids, create a religion/culture that makes sense to them and give them that directive.
deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
deogeo 8y ago
I thought it was already proven that humans are all the same?
- dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago
  I'm not sure if you're serious or not, but one thing we can say for sure is that there are differences between sexes and sets of genetic traits associated with the concept of race. Now, whether these differences extend beyond biology - that's what scientists currently would rather not discuss for fear of consequences. The authors of the article argue this attitude is harmful for the society as a whole.
throwawaymanbot 8y ago
The problem I have with it is that it is not a perfect science, but people talk about its studies/results as if it IS perfect science; And those results in the hands of certain people usually end up being used to classify a chunk of humanity as somehow not worthy of respect or worse, to be eradicated. It is not and will not be a perfect science. However, other sciences are not used to persecute humans. Introducing a bias which racist's undeniably have, pollutes the science, as we have seen in AI algorithm training recently.
swifting 8y ago
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.deseretnews.com/article/695215490/Dont-let-hysterics-taint-the-debate-on-IQ-heredity.amp https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.deseretnews.com/article/695... -Thomas Sowell
- tivert 8y ago
  I loved it when he read out that URL, too.
zozbot123 8y ago
One of the ways that stifling debate on such matters does harm, is that it sure makes it look like kooky opinions like James Watson's or Charles Murray's (seriously, if you don't think Murray is a kook, take a look at his work on "Human Achievement" and the purported measurement thereof - which is of course hopelessly biased to favor Europe and the West) have a lot more currency and more basis in science than they actually do.

27 points by danielam 8y ago

_Schizotypy 8y ago

IQ is a shit measure of intelligence

Proven 8y ago
You're trying to stifle the debate by debating. Good luck with that.
_Schizotypy 8y ago
wow thanks for all the downvotes, apparently nobody is current on psychological research https://www.webmd.com/brain/news/20121218/iq-test-really-measure-intelligence#1 https://www.webmd.com/brain/news/20121218/iq-test-really-mea... https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/beautiful-minds/200910/intelligent-testing https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/beautiful-minds/2009...
commandlinefan 8y ago
Maybe, maybe not, but how would you know? As of now, IQ is the _only_ measure of intelligence, so there's nothing to compare it against except anecdotes. You can say, "so and so has a low IQ but he seems smart to me", but there's nothing objective to compare it against, so there's really no good way to tell if it does measure that ephemeral quality that we attribute to the term "intelligence". It does track pretty closely with every other objective measure of intelligence, though, like academic performance and financial success.
- Junk_Collector 8y ago
  Of course if the IQ test was flawed and just a measure of where we expend resources on people rather than intelligence, it would strongly track with academic performance and financial success.
- _Schizotypy 8y ago
  Just because something is the only game in town doesn't mean you should use it, that logic doesn't make sense. We need to work on developing better systems rather than saying "oh well, it's the only thing we've got!"
  - candiodari 8y ago
    You don't understand. IQ isn't "the only game in town" because there aren't any other games, it's the only game in town because all other games were gradually unmasked to all be the "IQ game". IQ started out being one of about 5 measurements of people. Because of the age, one other measure was "nobility". Well, corrected for IQ, it turned out, that didn't matter. Same happened to many others. You can characterize and predict how humans will perform in many, many games with this single variable. It's the one that works best. So the current thinking is that there is only one measurement of intelligence. They all converge into a single one. It's called IQ because that was the first one that worked well enough, not because there's just one way to measure it. (Technically there is also age. Younger people are dumber than older ones up to a pretty high age. But that's the IQ game: age and "raw iq". Nothing else really matters in predicting if someone can succeed at something. IQ, the measure used, is corrected for age, so it should take that out. But a 10 year old with 100 IQ is, in absolute terms, dumber than a 20 year old with IQ 100) So your criticism is rather a lot beside the point. We have worked, a long and hard and often on developing better systems. We have just never actually succeeded in creating a truly different system (this of course is a "technically incorrect" statement. There are recent research results, there are ... blah blah blah ... there is no halfway decent reason to assume those research directions will lead to anything, but we're still trying. We've been doing that for >100 years, so the odds of the next big thing being in the pipeline right now is small). The basic observation behind IQ is that "all skills converge" (I would argue this has even been observed in machine learning). If you know one skill, whichever one it is, you become faster, better and quicker to learn almost any other skill. Not much, a little. In machine learning there are papers that point out that the ability to distinguish poodle races in pictures help with music composition. Not "much", but the key is what happens over time. It helps something like 2-5% (measured in time to learn a certain proficiency in music composition). The issue is what happens with kids when you give them new skills regularly over a 10 year period. Then they have 100 more skills, or 100 times 2% easier time to learn a new skill compared to someone who learned nothing. 100 times 2% easier ... is (1.02^100)-1, which is an enormous number (which is why IQ is an exponential score, not a linear one. Someone with 120 should be about double as smart as someone scoring 100. By which we mean that if you take a random intellectual skill, the odds of the person with 120 having some proficiency at that skill is about double that of the person with 100). To add insult to injury IQ compounds on itself. The higher your IQ, the easier it is to get it even higher. What people hate about IQ is the underlying theory clearly shows that human brains are designed to amplify differences in intelligence over time, not to minimize them. That is a clear and incontestable fact at this point. This is presumably also not a bad thing, or it would have been selected out. This also won't change because of any amount of changes occurring in psychology or the measurement of it. We can prevent ourselves from knowing about it, but we can't change it.

dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago

Any such debate is quickly flagged on HN. The authors call it 'sacred value'; I call it 'taboo'.

ForHackernews 8y ago
I don't trust the HN audience to have a sensible discussion on this topic. Too many armchair evolutionary "experts" and crypto-racists.
- goldenkey 8y ago
  Forgive me, what is a crypto-racist?
  - perfmode 8y ago
    The best art is often inaccessible to the intellect.
  - ForHackernews 8y ago
    Assuming you're asking in good faith: a racist who pretends not to be a racist. They'll often show up asking "Why can't we just have a reasonable discussion about low IQs in the Sub-Saharan African phenotype?" and ready with a Gish gallop list of dubious studies. If this post stays up, I'm sure they'll make an appearance.
    - postingtoofast 8y ago
      I see. And as soon as someone says something you don't like you're able to tell that they've been pulling this act right? Like, your spidey sense starts tingling or something? That's a neat skill!
    - goldenkey 8y ago
      Isn't it pretty much proven that IQ is mostly determined by genetics, and that races like the Ashkenazi Jews are extremely above average compared to the rest of the world? Tell me - what is racist about this scientific fact: Black people are stronger and run faster (indubitably due to slavery / selective breeding.) Jews are smarter (most nobel prizes.) Races are different, sure. To say that smarter or stronger means superior, is racist. But before that, understanding of differences... that's just science. Since strength and smartness are both held by society as virtues, it's easy to look like a racist if you simply state science.

rjkennedy98 8y ago

I think the bigger debate is whether eugenics or anti-dysgenics should be a policy goal of the government. Whether we like it or not - if we don't pass our best genes down to our children we are hurting future generations. I suspect the fact that we've turned so against eugenics goes hand in hand with the fact that we've also destroyed the environment, the financial well-being, and even the mental health of the next generation (especially here in America).

vmh1928 8y ago
In my observation (completely unbiased, mind you,) brains come from the mother. Therefore it's vitally important for the future of the human race that smart women have children. Certainly the stupid ones are.
throwawaymanbot 8y ago
Laughably you are posting this opinion here? Its not for YOU (or your ilk) to pick winners in the "best genes" debate. What you deem to be "good genes" is a garbage hypothesis based on your own personal outlook and bias. Your own personal outlook and bias is not how nature works now should it. (Luckily for those who may not meet your genetic standards) I think the bigger debate is why you care about eugenics and don't have the courage to just say what you really feel, instead of dressing it up like failed Nazi policy is what America and the west needs right now. (if they could just man up and implement a eugenics policy to save us all)
thebigspacefuck 8y ago
We don't know what the best genes are or will be. Furthermore as humans we work together to overcome personal shortcomings and develop technological/medical solutions to overcome genetic "issues". ADHD or ASD can be a gift or a curse depending on the environment you live in. I find different cultures/religions to be quite interesting in their characteristics of families. Mormons seem to have larger families. They require 10% of income goes to the church which increases the church's influence, so the church gets stronger the more people are in it. It's like a self-sustaining organism that gets stronger with each generation. As an intelligent individual belonging to no particular culture or religion, I feel less inclined to have children than others I know since it's not part of my values. It's likely that people like myself are going to have a difficult time passing on our genetics. If you want to encourage smart people to have kids, create a religion/culture that makes sense to them and give them that directive.

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

deogeo 8y ago

I thought it was already proven that humans are all the same?

dvfjsdhgfv 8y ago
I'm not sure if you're serious or not, but one thing we can say for sure is that there are differences between sexes and sets of genetic traits associated with the concept of race. Now, whether these differences extend beyond biology - that's what scientists currently would rather not discuss for fear of consequences. The authors of the article argue this attitude is harmful for the society as a whole.

throwawaymanbot 8y ago

The problem I have with it is that it is not a perfect science, but people talk about its studies/results as if it IS perfect science; And those results in the hands of certain people usually end up being used to classify a chunk of humanity as somehow not worthy of respect or worse, to be eradicated. It is not and will not be a perfect science. However, other sciences are not used to persecute humans. Introducing a bias which racist's undeniably have, pollutes the science, as we have seen in AI algorithm training recently.

swifting 8y ago

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.deseretnews.com/article/695215490/Dont-let-hysterics-taint-the-debate-on-IQ-heredity.amp https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.deseretnews.com/article/695... -Thomas Sowell

tivert 8y ago
I loved it when he read out that URL, too.

zozbot123 8y ago

One of the ways that stifling debate on such matters does harm, is that it sure makes it look like kooky opinions like James Watson's or Charles Murray's (seriously, if you don't think Murray is a kook, take a look at his work on "Human Achievement" and the purported measurement thereof - which is of course hopelessly biased to favor Europe and the West) have a lot more currency and more basis in science than they actually do.