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Well, the article obviously based intelligence on IQ to be scientifically sound for a paper. First, it is obvious that, in the top, a young smart person will b

by wslh 3y ago

Well, the article obviously based intelligence on IQ to be scientifically sound for a paper. First, it is obvious that, in the top, a young smart person will beat an older one in the kind of tests that IQ tests measure. You can see that in sports either, speed beyond strength is one obvious one. In average, young education could play a big role and better education in the old could beat a worse education. For example, an average observation, my father on his late 70s beats people in their 20s in doing mental math not because he is a genius because his generation had a better general education in math than the people at 20s. My dad is far from being a genius, he is not dumb either! but his average skills, as measured by IQ are obviously higher than the average young. Clearly my dad is now slower but also on language skills is fast enough to beat in associations an average young. Now, we are in 2024 and we need to reassess what IQ measures in terms of intelligence pragmatism. Also, the smart individual vs the smart group. For achieve success, even in the research laboratory you should forget about individual IQs and think differently. Another corollary for this is that psychology, at some extent, is time dependant and the trues from the 1900s could be falsenin 2024. It is not like math.

TheRoque 3y ago
IQ tests itself are age relative. The tests already take this into account, that's why your IQ is relative to people in the same age bracket. Basically, when you say "my IQ is 100", it's means that you are in the 50th percentile of the peers of the same age. It doesn't have any "absolue" value, and it shifts with the years (100 IQ 50 years ago is not the same as 100 IQ now)
- eru 3y ago
  Yes, though details depend on the exact test and how it's normalised.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
- wslh 3y ago
  The core problem is if IQ tests are context sensitive. IQ tests are relatively new in human history so we don't know how do they operate (without much changes) in a 400 year timespan.
- scotty79 3y ago
  Nobody asks you for your age when you are doing IQ test before giving you your result. Originally IQ was defined as "mental age" divided by actual age and it was for testing development of children. The actual age was capped at 16. So it was expected for any person 16 and over to have the same result in the test to have the same IQ.
eru 3y ago
> For example, an average observation, my father on his late 70s beat people in their 20s in doing mental math not because he is a genius because his generation had a better general education in math than the people at 20s. You don't need a 'better general education in math' to be good at mental arithmetic. In fact general education in math' is pretty much irrelevant to mental arithmetic. To be better at mental arithmetic, you need to learn and practice mental arithmetic. I am willing to bet your father did exactly that when he was younger, compared to today's 20 year olds? Your father might or might not also have had a great general math education. But that's pretty much irrelevant for the topic at hand. (I'm a mathematician by training, so I have a pretty good 'general education in math'. But how good my mental arithmetic is depends very heavily on whether I've recently had reason to practice. I was my best at mental arithmetic in about 7th and 8th grade. 7th grade is when calculators are first allowed in schools where and when I grew up. If, like me, you keep forgetting your calculator at home, that means all of a sudden your mental arithmetic gets a lot more of a workout than before.)
- wslh 3y ago
  I think we are saying the same thing: based on IQ tests my father, on average, could easily beat people on their 20s and this is not related to any advanced math or language education. He has a better education and, probably, better epoch for learning than, in average, young people now. I don't want to focus on his math mental skills but his overall education was better. He can also beat people in language/words associations.
  - rsynnott 3y ago
    > I don't want to focus on his math mental skills but his overall education was better. He can also beat people in language/words associations. Well, _different_, possibly. Neither word associations nor mental arithmetic are the be-all-and-end-all; mental arithmetic in particular has been more a party trick than anything else since the advent of the pocket calculator.
    - wslh 3y ago
hkpack 3y ago
> because his generation had a better general education in math than the people at 20s. Which we hear a lot these days but which is extremely difficult to prove. Formal education only helps you so far and only for some small percentage of students. I had access to what you mean by good math education through school and University, had private tutors at school and so on. I can say that with my peers there is a huge spectrum of innate math abilities. Only about 5% probably absorbed naturally everything we've been tutored through the school (1-2 persons in a class of 30). I am not gifted with math, so I have OK formal knowledge, however few of my friends who worked in humanities all their life are much better at "head math" than I ever was. Also, I live in a country which have aggressive math curriculum from young age. Looking how my kid goes through it I can say for sure, that it is massive waste of kids energy to be pushed for general population.
- wslh 3y ago
  > Which we hear a lot these days but which is extremely difficult to prove. I would say that is extremely easy to prove but writing a solid paper on that consumes a lot of resources. That is why conjectures are part of the scientific method: we can discuss about things that we think are true or not before making a multi-year effort to prove the point in a scientific way. The problem is when people confuse scientific publications with truth. In math that would be easier for the practitioners but in social sciences we know that we can publish ala Sokal affair.
thebligdiv 3y ago
You're describing the difference between fluid and crystallized intelligence. the first one peaks at age ~20, the second one peaks at age ~50: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_and_crystallized_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_and_crystallized_intelli...

by wslh 3y ago

TheRoque 3y ago

IQ tests itself are age relative. The tests already take this into account, that's why your IQ is relative to people in the same age bracket. Basically, when you say "my IQ is 100", it's means that you are in the 50th percentile of the peers of the same age. It doesn't have any "absolue" value, and it shifts with the years (100 IQ 50 years ago is not the same as 100 IQ now)

eru 3y ago
Yes, though details depend on the exact test and how it's normalised.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
wslh 3y ago
The core problem is if IQ tests are context sensitive. IQ tests are relatively new in human history so we don't know how do they operate (without much changes) in a 400 year timespan.
scotty79 3y ago
Nobody asks you for your age when you are doing IQ test before giving you your result. Originally IQ was defined as "mental age" divided by actual age and it was for testing development of children. The actual age was capped at 16. So it was expected for any person 16 and over to have the same result in the test to have the same IQ.

eru 3y ago

> For example, an average observation, my father on his late 70s beat people in their 20s in doing mental math not because he is a genius because his generation had a better general education in math than the people at 20s. You don't need a 'better general education in math' to be good at mental arithmetic. In fact general education in math' is pretty much irrelevant to mental arithmetic. To be better at mental arithmetic, you need to learn and practice mental arithmetic. I am willing to bet your father did exactly that when he was younger, compared to today's 20 year olds? Your father might or might not also have had a great general math education. But that's pretty much irrelevant for the topic at hand. (I'm a mathematician by training, so I have a pretty good 'general education in math'. But how good my mental arithmetic is depends very heavily on whether I've recently had reason to practice. I was my best at mental arithmetic in about 7th and 8th grade. 7th grade is when calculators are first allowed in schools where and when I grew up. If, like me, you keep forgetting your calculator at home, that means all of a sudden your mental arithmetic gets a lot more of a workout than before.)

wslh 3y ago
I think we are saying the same thing: based on IQ tests my father, on average, could easily beat people on their 20s and this is not related to any advanced math or language education. He has a better education and, probably, better epoch for learning than, in average, young people now. I don't want to focus on his math mental skills but his overall education was better. He can also beat people in language/words associations.
- rsynnott 3y ago
  > I don't want to focus on his math mental skills but his overall education was better. He can also beat people in language/words associations. Well, _different_, possibly. Neither word associations nor mental arithmetic are the be-all-and-end-all; mental arithmetic in particular has been more a party trick than anything else since the advent of the pocket calculator.
  - wslh 3y ago

hkpack 3y ago

> because his generation had a better general education in math than the people at 20s. Which we hear a lot these days but which is extremely difficult to prove. Formal education only helps you so far and only for some small percentage of students. I had access to what you mean by good math education through school and University, had private tutors at school and so on. I can say that with my peers there is a huge spectrum of innate math abilities. Only about 5% probably absorbed naturally everything we've been tutored through the school (1-2 persons in a class of 30). I am not gifted with math, so I have OK formal knowledge, however few of my friends who worked in humanities all their life are much better at "head math" than I ever was. Also, I live in a country which have aggressive math curriculum from young age. Looking how my kid goes through it I can say for sure, that it is massive waste of kids energy to be pushed for general population.

wslh 3y ago
> Which we hear a lot these days but which is extremely difficult to prove. I would say that is extremely easy to prove but writing a solid paper on that consumes a lot of resources. That is why conjectures are part of the scientific method: we can discuss about things that we think are true or not before making a multi-year effort to prove the point in a scientific way. The problem is when people confuse scientific publications with truth. In math that would be easier for the practitioners but in social sciences we know that we can publish ala Sokal affair.

thebligdiv 3y ago

You're describing the difference between fluid and crystallized intelligence. the first one peaks at age ~20, the second one peaks at age ~50: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_and_crystallized_intelligence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fluid_and_crystallized_intelli...