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Comment by naniwaduni | Hacker News Reader

> That is (in part) Nassim Nicholas Taleb's point: we use IQ to select for success, then say IQ is correlated with success. It is circular reasoning.

This would only be correct if the SAT were expressly an IQ test, and we selected people based on SAT score for that reason.

To put it another way, making this point is kind of like selecting for tall players for a basketball team, then saying weight is correlated with fitness to be on a basketball team. That height and weight are correlated doesn't make this circular reasoning.

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This seems like nit picking, doesn’t really change the patent posters argument.

Yeah totally, or like selecting for confident people where you tell people who score well on the test that they're super confident.

Tall is an absolute, objective measure of a real thing that exists. IQ is NOT a measure of a thing that exists.

Similar effects can be found throwing dice and ascribing the total to an IQ score, then telling parents, teachers what the poor kid's IQ is as though it were their height. It's insane.

http://homepages.gac.edu/~jwotton2/PSY225/rosenthal66.pdf

https://sites.google.com/site/7arosenthal/

Per: Rosenthal & Jacobson, 1966 study, which deserves wider appreciation?

I want to emphasise 1966 was when this was published so it isn't overlooked as we all read pretty fast with these things.

edit:

Found a link to the original paper:

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.488...

More recent criticism of the original:

https://thenewstatistics.com/itns/2018/04/03/weve-been-here-...

If it is not a real thing, how does it succeed in having an influence over results on a measurement device? Results on cognitive tests have a relatively high test-retest reliability.

> IQ is NOT a measure of a thing that exists.

I don't understand your concept of something "existing" or not. Do you believe that a "speed" exist ? That a "center of gravity" exists ? That a "temperature" exist ? People who say "IQ is what IQ tests measure" sound to me like they could say "temperature is what thermometers measure". temperature does not "exist" it is molecules movements all the way down, yet it is a meaningful/useful concept. Same goes for IQ or "g factor".

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