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I don't see how any of that supports your claim that "current evidence suggests that the 'baseline' normal human IQ without genetic defects would be test at nea

I don't see how any of that supports your claim that "current evidence suggests that the 'baseline' normal human IQ without genetic defects would be test at near genius levels in ideal environment."

Retric 11y ago
A while ago people tried to find what the ‘average’ criminal looked like, and by averaging a lot of faces they came up with an above average attractiveness composite. The idea was if you took a normal bland face and randomly changed something you would on average get a worse outcome, and occasionally gets significantly above average effects.(Most people: more negative traits than positive)<(average model: few negative or positive traits aka forgettable) < (super model: few negative traits and enough difference to be memorable) A similar idea seems to fit intelligence, where the most common traits in a population are beneficial and most mutations are generally negative. So, take the just the 'most common’ traits and add in poor nutrient absorption in the gut and you get lower IQ even if the connection is fairly indirect. The question then becomes what happens if you just take the most common traits for everything? Statistically, you would expect an above average as most people have far more negative than positive mutations, but not an outstanding result. Now combine an above average baseline (50% of variability) with an ideal environment (50% of variability) and bam really high test scores.
- JesperRavn 11y ago
  In place of the promised evidence, you've just provided an argument that makes zero sense. Your argument amounts to proving that average people are above average.
  - Retric 11y ago
    Sorry if that was not clear, I was trying to summarize Population genetics which gives some counterintuitive results. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_genetics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_genetics The most interesting one is traits spread slower when there less beneficial meaning there are generally few big wins waiting to spread. As the winners have mostly already taken over. Edit: Even simpler: Consider a simple model with 1,000 human traits. For each you have a 99% chance of baseline and a 1% chance of -1. And to be fair there is 1 extra trait that has a 0.01% chance of being +1, 99% chance of being +0, and a 0.99% chance of being -1. Randomly a few really lucky people might hit the full +1. But even most people with the positive mutation are still 0 or negative something. If you graphed this for 10,000 people you would see something approximating a bell curve centered on a negative number.
    - JesperRavn 11y ago
      Ok I understand you now. You are simply defining "baseline" to be "free of negative mutations". But this is not a useful definition for these purposes. Given that you have stated that genes account for 50% of variability in intelligence (whether this variability stems from positive or negative mutations doesn't matter), you would actually disagree with the claim that "we are all born basically with equal potential" Your definition of "normal" in this context is not relevant and distracts from the actual issue of genetic variability vs environment. Imagine a teacher saying "no, you didn't miss out on the intelligence gene. You just have a lot of bad genes that make you less intelligent."
      - Retric 11y ago
        Clearly down's syndrome demonstrates we are not all exactly equal. But, where on the surface a negative model seems similar, you would expect all populations to end up fairly similar on average. However if there where a few major improvements spreading you would expect to see significant differences at the population level (Because positive mutations would not show up randomly in equal proportion in every population.) Further, where 50% of the difference is inheritable less than 50% of that is from DNA with things like mothers nutrition playing a major role. Also, a chunk of the remainder is eaten up by the Major Defects, so if your look at 'normal' people DNA is going to play a smaller role than enviorment.

I don't see how any of that supports your claim that "current evidence suggests that the 'baseline' normal human IQ without genetic defects would be test at near genius levels in ideal environment."

Retric 11y ago

A while ago people tried to find what the ‘average’ criminal looked like, and by averaging a lot of faces they came up with an above average attractiveness composite. The idea was if you took a normal bland face and randomly changed something you would on average get a worse outcome, and occasionally gets significantly above average effects.(Most people: more negative traits than positive)<(average model: few negative or positive traits aka forgettable) < (super model: few negative traits and enough difference to be memorable) A similar idea seems to fit intelligence, where the most common traits in a population are beneficial and most mutations are generally negative. So, take the just the 'most common’ traits and add in poor nutrient absorption in the gut and you get lower IQ even if the connection is fairly indirect. The question then becomes what happens if you just take the most common traits for everything? Statistically, you would expect an above average as most people have far more negative than positive mutations, but not an outstanding result. Now combine an above average baseline (50% of variability) with an ideal environment (50% of variability) and bam really high test scores.

JesperRavn 11y ago
In place of the promised evidence, you've just provided an argument that makes zero sense. Your argument amounts to proving that average people are above average.
- Retric 11y ago
  Sorry if that was not clear, I was trying to summarize Population genetics which gives some counterintuitive results. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_genetics https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_genetics The most interesting one is traits spread slower when there less beneficial meaning there are generally few big wins waiting to spread. As the winners have mostly already taken over. Edit: Even simpler: Consider a simple model with 1,000 human traits. For each you have a 99% chance of baseline and a 1% chance of -1. And to be fair there is 1 extra trait that has a 0.01% chance of being +1, 99% chance of being +0, and a 0.99% chance of being -1. Randomly a few really lucky people might hit the full +1. But even most people with the positive mutation are still 0 or negative something. If you graphed this for 10,000 people you would see something approximating a bell curve centered on a negative number.
  - JesperRavn 11y ago
    Ok I understand you now. You are simply defining "baseline" to be "free of negative mutations". But this is not a useful definition for these purposes. Given that you have stated that genes account for 50% of variability in intelligence (whether this variability stems from positive or negative mutations doesn't matter), you would actually disagree with the claim that "we are all born basically with equal potential" Your definition of "normal" in this context is not relevant and distracts from the actual issue of genetic variability vs environment. Imagine a teacher saying "no, you didn't miss out on the intelligence gene. You just have a lot of bad genes that make you less intelligent."
    - Retric 11y ago
      Clearly down's syndrome demonstrates we are not all exactly equal. But, where on the surface a negative model seems similar, you would expect all populations to end up fairly similar on average. However if there where a few major improvements spreading you would expect to see significant differences at the population level (Because positive mutations would not show up randomly in equal proportion in every population.) Further, where 50% of the difference is inheritable less than 50% of that is from DNA with things like mothers nutrition playing a major role. Also, a chunk of the remainder is eaten up by the Major Defects, so if your look at 'normal' people DNA is going to play a smaller role than enviorment.