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> IQ tests measure something real and objective called the g factor Sure, and NQ tests do too, because look how well graciousness correlates with cheerfulness!

> IQ tests measure something real and objective called the g factor Sure, and NQ tests do too, because look how well graciousness correlates with cheerfulness! That can't be an accident, can it? Less snarkily, a better analogy would be athletic ability. Suppose you take a bunch of people and measure how fast they can run, how well they can shoot free throws, and how far they can throw a football. Will the results be correlated? Of course, some people are more athletic than others. Does that mean there's a quantity called 'athleticism' that we can objectively measure with a number? No; and not because all people are equally athletic, but because you're trying to take a squishy subjective English language word and pretend it's a scalar value. > I would hardly call it a "whole field". The problem isn't the size of the field, it's that academics work within their field, they don't refute it. There's a very uncomfortable result about IQ tests that a generation of psychologists have tried to explain away, and I maintain that the reason they haven't succeeded is because they are institutionally incapable of saying, "Hey, maybe this is pseudoscience."

zaptheimpaler 4y ago
The g factor is predictive of performance in jobs and income though. Even in your own example, yes we could make a test that involves running and throwing, and yes it would be predictive of performance in various sports. One of the tests for aerobic capacity is called VO2max. It is a number with units mL/g/min. Like IQ, this is not the only factor but it does have predictive power.
- iq_throw_123 4y ago
  How would that test do at predicting achievement in archery? How about curling? Are those not "real" sports, or is athleticism a squishy human concept rather than an objectively measurable value?
  - legostormtroopr 4y ago
    The amount of strength to draw an archery bow, and steady ones body, would be closely related to strength and VO2Max - with O2 being required for both muscle activity and holding ones breath. And curling is a highly phsyical sport, and for sweepers () its very similar to a full body sprint for each hurl. There are plenty of metrics you can use to quantify someones atheletic capability, not least of which is your bodies ability to hold and transport oxygen. () I don't know the technical term, but the point stands.
  - briHass 4y ago
    This study found a correlation between VO2max and archery performance of 0.68 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=1&printcase=1&hbnr=1&hmb=1 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=... As noted in the study, the largest influence they tested for archery performance was height. I'd bet a large sum of money that height is also a strong positive influence on many sports (eg basketball), similar to how G is an influence on many cognitive 'sports' like occupations. We can easily measure height and most would have no trouble believing that (largely genetic) factor greatly influences athletic performance. Why is IQ so different?
    - Apocryphon 4y ago
      Wonder if it's likewise applicable to snooker.
  - noughtme 4y ago
    Didn't take much googling: https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=1&printcase=1&hbnr=1&hmb=1 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=... I didn't see any specific research related to curling, but it is definitely a fairly high peak intensity activity that demands a high level of fitness: https://curlnoca.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Curling-Heart-Rate-Recovery-Study.pdf https://curlnoca.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Curling-Heart...
  - zaptheimpaler 4y ago
    Well i listed 2 activities, you could certainly add more to the test. Just as we add many questions to an IQ test. Even if the test doesn't predict performance in every single sport, that doesn't mean it has zero predictive power in all sports. --- Similarly, I'm not saying IQ is destiny or even the largest factor in any given endeavour, its not. But its equally wrong to say its not a factor at all. It is somewhere in the middle. Like most metrics, it doesn't capture the entirety of the squishy concept as you say, but it does capture something about it. I think we understand this in many other areas. Look at PE ratio or revenue growth for a stock, look at goals on target for a football striker, VO2max or running economy for a runner, mileage for a car. IQ is understandably more controversial but the concept is the same.
- pcthrowaway 4y ago
  Is g factor more predictive of income than the financial class of the family you were born into? Why not just associate intelligence with how wealthy your parents are and call it done?
  - dragonwriter 4y ago
    > Is g factor more predictive of income than the financial class of the family you were born into? No, but it predicts variation that is not explained by family wealth. > Why not just associate intelligence with how wealthy your parents are and call it done? Because they are separate factors with distinct contributions.
- astrange 4y ago
  The result of a test can be predictive of job performance simply because the result of /any/ test would be predictive of it, because it shows you're willing and able to take and complete tests. This does not mean the score on a specific test is "real". Minimal example: if you gave a test to a living person and a corpse, only one of them would finish it, and that one would also have a higher income. Also note the "highest intelligence" jobs don't always have the highest income, like academia, but rather involve taking lots of tests as a prerequisite.
- thworp 4y ago
  [flagged]
- naijaboiler 4y ago
  that something is predictive does not mean it measures something else. Nobody will argue with you that IQ tests are predictive of some things, but it still doesn't measure intelligence. It measures something, whatever that something is, that has some predictive power on some other things
QuiDortDine 4y ago
Respectfully, you chose the wrong hill to die on. Psychology has many squishy parts, but psychometry is basically the closest thing it has to a hard science. The other comment adresses your NQ argument, but here's something I don't understand: "There's a very uncomfortable result about IQ tests that a generation of psychologists have tried to explain away" This reeks of anti-intellectualism by the way ("can't trust the experts!"), but I am curious to know what you're referring to. It can't be the validity or reliability of IQ tests, surely? Both have been very solidly established for a long time.
- iq_throw_123 4y ago
  > This reeks of anti-intellectualism by the way ("can't trust the experts!"), but I am curious to know what you're referring to. I'm referring to HBD. Respectfully, if you're not familiar with that then you have a lot of prior art to catch up on before you expound on how well-grounded psychometry is.
  - QuiDortDine 4y ago
    HBD is so fringe I had a hard time googling it. Just because a subset of a subfield is politically motivated and hateful does not invalidate the whole field. That intelligence testing can be misrepresented to defend racism is an argument against humans, not against the science. Meanwhile, unbiased research has shown for a long time that there is no significant variations in IQ between races when considering socioeconomic factors. We've determined this with, guess what, psychometry, and it is the overwhelming consensus in psychology. If this was your main gripe with it, rest assured that the field you so underestimate is entirely dismissive of it. It seems to me you're just looking for ways to dismiss decades of research based on misinformation perpetuated, overwhelmingly, by non-experts. Congratulations, you are in this group.
    - Apocryphon 4y ago
      Thoughts on this comment about the supposed hidebound nature of the field of psychometrics? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29798887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29798887
ndriscoll 4y ago
> Will the results be correlated? Of course, some people are more athletic than others. Does that mean there's a quantity called 'athleticism' that we can objectively measure with a number? No Admittedly I haven't really studied statistics, but can't you do something like measure those abilities for a population, do a PCA, and define athleticism to be the first principal component?
- AstralStorm 4y ago
  And then you find out that the first component is height x age. :) PCA/CCA almost never tells you what the components are. ICA is a bit better at that but still not great.
runarberg 4y ago
Thankfully I believe this is changing. Stephen Jay Gould is among the top cited authors within psychology despite not being a psychologist. The psychologists Gould criticized are slowly dying of (e.g. Arthur Jensen) or being fired in disgrace (e.g. Richard Lynn). A new generation of psychologist aren’t picking up their theories, and a new generation of policy makers are distancing them self from IQ science (e.g. the SAT was renamed for this purpose). I think psychologists have spent enough ink on this non-sense and correctly moved on. It is now up to historians to talk about how damaging this theory truly was, and what the motivation was of policy makers that believed in this pseudo-science. Gould did a terrific job doing exactly that, and a more recent work of Angela Saini Superior: The Return of Race Science is another powerful account of this history, although she is not as optimistic about the state of affairs as I am.

zaptheimpaler 4y ago

The g factor is predictive of performance in jobs and income though. Even in your own example, yes we could make a test that involves running and throwing, and yes it would be predictive of performance in various sports. One of the tests for aerobic capacity is called VO2max. It is a number with units mL/g/min. Like IQ, this is not the only factor but it does have predictive power.

iq_throw_123 4y ago
How would that test do at predicting achievement in archery? How about curling? Are those not "real" sports, or is athleticism a squishy human concept rather than an objectively measurable value?
- legostormtroopr 4y ago
  The amount of strength to draw an archery bow, and steady ones body, would be closely related to strength and VO2Max - with O2 being required for both muscle activity and holding ones breath. And curling is a highly phsyical sport, and for sweepers () its very similar to a full body sprint for each hurl. There are plenty of metrics you can use to quantify someones atheletic capability, not least of which is your bodies ability to hold and transport oxygen. () I don't know the technical term, but the point stands.
- briHass 4y ago
  This study found a correlation between VO2max and archery performance of 0.68 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=1&printcase=1&hbnr=1&hmb=1 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=... As noted in the study, the largest influence they tested for archery performance was height. I'd bet a large sum of money that height is also a strong positive influence on many sports (eg basketball), similar to how G is an influence on many cognitive 'sports' like occupations. We can easily measure height and most would have no trouble believing that (largely genetic) factor greatly influences athletic performance. Why is IQ so different?
  - Apocryphon 4y ago
    Wonder if it's likewise applicable to snooker.
- noughtme 4y ago
  Didn't take much googling: https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=1&printcase=1&hbnr=1&hmb=1 https://aassjournal.com/browse.php?a_id=897&slc_lang=en&sid=... I didn't see any specific research related to curling, but it is definitely a fairly high peak intensity activity that demands a high level of fitness: https://curlnoca.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Curling-Heart-Rate-Recovery-Study.pdf https://curlnoca.ca/wp-content/uploads/2013/06/Curling-Heart...
- zaptheimpaler 4y ago
  Well i listed 2 activities, you could certainly add more to the test. Just as we add many questions to an IQ test. Even if the test doesn't predict performance in every single sport, that doesn't mean it has zero predictive power in all sports. --- Similarly, I'm not saying IQ is destiny or even the largest factor in any given endeavour, its not. But its equally wrong to say its not a factor at all. It is somewhere in the middle. Like most metrics, it doesn't capture the entirety of the squishy concept as you say, but it does capture something about it. I think we understand this in many other areas. Look at PE ratio or revenue growth for a stock, look at goals on target for a football striker, VO2max or running economy for a runner, mileage for a car. IQ is understandably more controversial but the concept is the same.
pcthrowaway 4y ago
Is g factor more predictive of income than the financial class of the family you were born into? Why not just associate intelligence with how wealthy your parents are and call it done?
- dragonwriter 4y ago
  > Is g factor more predictive of income than the financial class of the family you were born into? No, but it predicts variation that is not explained by family wealth. > Why not just associate intelligence with how wealthy your parents are and call it done? Because they are separate factors with distinct contributions.
astrange 4y ago
The result of a test can be predictive of job performance simply because the result of /any/ test would be predictive of it, because it shows you're willing and able to take and complete tests. This does not mean the score on a specific test is "real". Minimal example: if you gave a test to a living person and a corpse, only one of them would finish it, and that one would also have a higher income. Also note the "highest intelligence" jobs don't always have the highest income, like academia, but rather involve taking lots of tests as a prerequisite.
thworp 4y ago
[flagged]
naijaboiler 4y ago
that something is predictive does not mean it measures something else. Nobody will argue with you that IQ tests are predictive of some things, but it still doesn't measure intelligence. It measures something, whatever that something is, that has some predictive power on some other things

QuiDortDine 4y ago

Respectfully, you chose the wrong hill to die on. Psychology has many squishy parts, but psychometry is basically the closest thing it has to a hard science. The other comment adresses your NQ argument, but here's something I don't understand: "There's a very uncomfortable result about IQ tests that a generation of psychologists have tried to explain away" This reeks of anti-intellectualism by the way ("can't trust the experts!"), but I am curious to know what you're referring to. It can't be the validity or reliability of IQ tests, surely? Both have been very solidly established for a long time.

iq_throw_123 4y ago
> This reeks of anti-intellectualism by the way ("can't trust the experts!"), but I am curious to know what you're referring to. I'm referring to HBD. Respectfully, if you're not familiar with that then you have a lot of prior art to catch up on before you expound on how well-grounded psychometry is.
- QuiDortDine 4y ago
  HBD is so fringe I had a hard time googling it. Just because a subset of a subfield is politically motivated and hateful does not invalidate the whole field. That intelligence testing can be misrepresented to defend racism is an argument against humans, not against the science. Meanwhile, unbiased research has shown for a long time that there is no significant variations in IQ between races when considering socioeconomic factors. We've determined this with, guess what, psychometry, and it is the overwhelming consensus in psychology. If this was your main gripe with it, rest assured that the field you so underestimate is entirely dismissive of it. It seems to me you're just looking for ways to dismiss decades of research based on misinformation perpetuated, overwhelmingly, by non-experts. Congratulations, you are in this group.
  - Apocryphon 4y ago
    Thoughts on this comment about the supposed hidebound nature of the field of psychometrics? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29798887 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29798887

ndriscoll 4y ago

> Will the results be correlated? Of course, some people are more athletic than others. Does that mean there's a quantity called 'athleticism' that we can objectively measure with a number? No Admittedly I haven't really studied statistics, but can't you do something like measure those abilities for a population, do a PCA, and define athleticism to be the first principal component?

AstralStorm 4y ago
And then you find out that the first component is height x age. :) PCA/CCA almost never tells you what the components are. ICA is a bit better at that but still not great.

runarberg 4y ago

Thankfully I believe this is changing. Stephen Jay Gould is among the top cited authors within psychology despite not being a psychologist. The psychologists Gould criticized are slowly dying of (e.g. Arthur Jensen) or being fired in disgrace (e.g. Richard Lynn). A new generation of psychologist aren’t picking up their theories, and a new generation of policy makers are distancing them self from IQ science (e.g. the SAT was renamed for this purpose). I think psychologists have spent enough ink on this non-sense and correctly moved on. It is now up to historians to talk about how damaging this theory truly was, and what the motivation was of policy makers that believed in this pseudo-science. Gould did a terrific job doing exactly that, and a more recent work of Angela Saini Superior: The Return of Race Science is another powerful account of this history, although she is not as optimistic about the state of affairs as I am.