3 ms·

Really? I only ever thought of IQ as a measurement of elitism, not intelligence. I've met some really smart guys with IQs much lower than you'd expect, and deal

by iuguy 18y ago

Really? I only ever thought of IQ as a measurement of elitism, not intelligence. I've met some really smart guys with IQs much lower than you'd expect, and dealt with some really stupid higher IQ folk.

tokenadult 18y ago
I've met some really smart guys with IQs much lower than you'd expect, and dealt with some really stupid higher IQ folk. This accords with my experience after fifty years of life, but is not quite a proof that IQ is meaningless. IQ tests estimate a kind of abstract problem-solving ability useful for many real-world tasks, and correlated with life success in various occupations. But IQ is not the same as rationality, http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/book.asp?isbn=9780300123852 http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/book.asp?isbn=97803001238... http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Tests-Miss-Psychology/dp/030012385X http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Tests-Miss-Psycholog... or, if you prefer this terminology, IQ is not the same thing as wisdom, http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521880077 http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=978... http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Beyond-Flynn-Effect/dp/0521741475/ref=ed_oe_p http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Beyond-Flynn-Effect/... so it shouldn't be terribly surprising to see irrational or unwise behavior from high-IQ individuals, as I certainly have.
jerf 18y ago
As much fun as it is to decry high IQs as the sole purview of snotty brats who can't actually amount to anything in the real world, it is still nothing but a combination of sour grapes and a biased sample. You notice the brats, you don't notice the high-IQ people that aren't snotty brats. Science says that A: IQ clearly doesn't measure "real intelligence" B: Whatever "real intelligence" is, IQ does correlate with it fairly highly (as well as a number of other measurements), though you must understand what "correlate" means to fully comprehend that and C: real intelligence has real impacts on your real life, no matter how wonderful or awful that may sound. It's real. The science is strong. The science is much more complicated and nuanced than most people understand, or, more profound, than most people want to understand. If you want to really understand the world, dismissing IQ is not a good start. (Nor is putting it on a pedestal, of course. If you want to understand the real world, recognizing that there is ground in between is also pretty helpful.)
- iuguy 18y ago
  I'm going to discuss your comment in three parts. Thank god this isn't reddit as I'd probably follow up with a "Your shit's all fucked up and you talk like a fag" or a pun type post. Your first assertion is that people who decry high IQs as the sole purviews of snotty brats is a combination of sour grapes and a biased sample. I can't speak based on a scientific sample of high IQ folk. I can only speak for myself and people I know. My IQ (in case you were wondering) is 167 according to SB5 testing (I was tested through most of my childhood and some of my early academic life) putting me in the fairly smart range. To provide a counterpoint, I'll quote Alfred Binet (the 'B' in SB5) and just say: "The scale, properly speaking, does not permit the measure of intelligence, because intellectual qualities are not superposable, and therefore cannot be measured as linear surfaces are measured." - Binet 1905. There are snotty brats with low IQs. There are snotty brats with high IQs. Thus we can surmise that in any given sample of sufficient size regardless of IQ there are snotty brats. If you don't believe me I suggest you visit 4chan.org sometime. Your second comment tries to pair correlation with reality. In some cases this works, in your example it doesn't as "real intelligence" is undefined, yet we are expected to accept that this undefined and unmeasured form of intelligence correlates with IQ. If you were to define what constitutes real intelligence then there's a point of discussion, but you must admit that your statement 'Whatever "real intelligence" is' implies that you don't know what it is - to be honest no-one does and that's the problem. An IQ score doesn't provide a measure of real intelligence, only problem solving within a measured subset of boundaries. This then acts as a counterpoint for your third argument being that: The science cannot be strong if "real intelligence" is less definable than "Real Madrid". Therefore I pose the counterpoint that correlation of an individual's success rate of "Real Madrid" (whatever "success rate" is) is more valid than correlation with "Real intelligence". After all, "Real Intelligence" never won La Liga, the European cup, and so on, yet noone would ever argue against the genius of Real Madrid's European cup winning squads, no more than you could argue with the master strokes of Van Gogh or Raphael, nor the abilities of Newton - despite his inferior understanding of modern mathematics and logic, nor the ancient greeks despite their limitations. One of the things I really appreciate about HN is that people have constructive arguments and disagreements. I completely accept that there's an element of fun in the topic I discussed (particularly about football teams) but I would like to say that although I don't agree with you, thanks for expressing your opinion and challenging mine. It's always good to have to rethink your worldview :)
Conservationist 18y ago
In what case is a person with an IQ of 105 smarter than someone with an IQ of 125? Please cite examples.

by iuguy 18y ago

tokenadult 18y ago

I've met some really smart guys with IQs much lower than you'd expect, and dealt with some really stupid higher IQ folk. This accords with my experience after fifty years of life, but is not quite a proof that IQ is meaningless. IQ tests estimate a kind of abstract problem-solving ability useful for many real-world tasks, and correlated with life success in various occupations. But IQ is not the same as rationality, http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/book.asp?isbn=9780300123852 http://yalepress.yale.edu/yupbooks/book.asp?isbn=97803001238... http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Tests-Miss-Psychology/dp/030012385X http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Tests-Miss-Psycholog... or, if you prefer this terminology, IQ is not the same thing as wisdom, http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=9780521880077 http://www.cambridge.org/us/catalogue/catalogue.asp?isbn=978... http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Beyond-Flynn-Effect/dp/0521741475/ref=ed_oe_p http://www.amazon.com/What-Intelligence-Beyond-Flynn-Effect/... so it shouldn't be terribly surprising to see irrational or unwise behavior from high-IQ individuals, as I certainly have.

jerf 18y ago

As much fun as it is to decry high IQs as the sole purview of snotty brats who can't actually amount to anything in the real world, it is still nothing but a combination of sour grapes and a biased sample. You notice the brats, you don't notice the high-IQ people that aren't snotty brats. Science says that A: IQ clearly doesn't measure "real intelligence" B: Whatever "real intelligence" is, IQ does correlate with it fairly highly (as well as a number of other measurements), though you must understand what "correlate" means to fully comprehend that and C: real intelligence has real impacts on your real life, no matter how wonderful or awful that may sound. It's real. The science is strong. The science is much more complicated and nuanced than most people understand, or, more profound, than most people want to understand. If you want to really understand the world, dismissing IQ is not a good start. (Nor is putting it on a pedestal, of course. If you want to understand the real world, recognizing that there is ground in between is also pretty helpful.)

iuguy 18y ago
I'm going to discuss your comment in three parts. Thank god this isn't reddit as I'd probably follow up with a "Your shit's all fucked up and you talk like a fag" or a pun type post. Your first assertion is that people who decry high IQs as the sole purviews of snotty brats is a combination of sour grapes and a biased sample. I can't speak based on a scientific sample of high IQ folk. I can only speak for myself and people I know. My IQ (in case you were wondering) is 167 according to SB5 testing (I was tested through most of my childhood and some of my early academic life) putting me in the fairly smart range. To provide a counterpoint, I'll quote Alfred Binet (the 'B' in SB5) and just say: "The scale, properly speaking, does not permit the measure of intelligence, because intellectual qualities are not superposable, and therefore cannot be measured as linear surfaces are measured." - Binet 1905. There are snotty brats with low IQs. There are snotty brats with high IQs. Thus we can surmise that in any given sample of sufficient size regardless of IQ there are snotty brats. If you don't believe me I suggest you visit 4chan.org sometime. Your second comment tries to pair correlation with reality. In some cases this works, in your example it doesn't as "real intelligence" is undefined, yet we are expected to accept that this undefined and unmeasured form of intelligence correlates with IQ. If you were to define what constitutes real intelligence then there's a point of discussion, but you must admit that your statement 'Whatever "real intelligence" is' implies that you don't know what it is - to be honest no-one does and that's the problem. An IQ score doesn't provide a measure of real intelligence, only problem solving within a measured subset of boundaries. This then acts as a counterpoint for your third argument being that: The science cannot be strong if "real intelligence" is less definable than "Real Madrid". Therefore I pose the counterpoint that correlation of an individual's success rate of "Real Madrid" (whatever "success rate" is) is more valid than correlation with "Real intelligence". After all, "Real Intelligence" never won La Liga, the European cup, and so on, yet noone would ever argue against the genius of Real Madrid's European cup winning squads, no more than you could argue with the master strokes of Van Gogh or Raphael, nor the abilities of Newton - despite his inferior understanding of modern mathematics and logic, nor the ancient greeks despite their limitations. One of the things I really appreciate about HN is that people have constructive arguments and disagreements. I completely accept that there's an element of fun in the topic I discussed (particularly about football teams) but I would like to say that although I don't agree with you, thanks for expressing your opinion and challenging mine. It's always good to have to rethink your worldview :)

Conservationist 18y ago

In what case is a person with an IQ of 105 smarter than someone with an IQ of 125? Please cite examples.