IQ is not a perfect measure of intelligence, but I think it's better than no measure of intelligence.
The takeaway is that IQ doesn't matter as much as other attributes (character, learned skills, etc.) in life outcomes.
HN style crows way overvalue IQ style skills when intelligence has multiple dimensions, many of which matter more than IQ.
IQ is effectively just a measure of test-taking skills. That's useful in some areas, but you could see someone like Gengis Khan or Nikola Tesla be incredibly intelligent and a poor test taker.
[1] https://heckmanequation.org/resource/i-q-isnt-everything/
Uhuh.... so this line it's crazy, right?
It's really strange you concede that we have no theory and hence no way of verifying whether an IQ score is a valid and reliable measure of the thing we have no theory of... and yet, you say it is a "proxy for intelligence"
The entire edifice of research which makes these claims is a product of a pseudoscientific use of statistics by amateur statisticians. The vast majority of the results you think exist in the literature are frauds, and often egregious ones at that.
A human being is one of the most complex systems known to exist in nature, and the frauds in psychometrics are very far away from being up to the task of studying them. The greatest minds in applied sciences, matehmatics and statistics would largely throw up their hands at the job of measuring "intelligence" --- that some fools havent, is no good thing.
> The entire edifice of research which makes these claims is a product of a pseudoscientific use of statistics by amateur statisticians.
That's bollocks. It's just a topic that's too complex. Unfortunately, everybody likes it and draws conclusions from it. Even the HR department. If you would say we should ignore IQ measurements in society, I would agree. But it's not pseudo-scientific use of statistics. Nor all done by amateurs. It might even be more scientific than string theory or dark matter.
None have PhDs in statistics. They're all people who got into psychology and were given GUIs by the maths department. Their papers are a symptom of what happens when you press the "ANONVA" button and print the results.
The entire field is an egregious testament to pseudo-intellectual pseudoscience. It's shocking.
There's nothing there. It's unfathomably bad.
A lot of psychology is bad research. There's a reason there's a reproduction crisis. Statisticians are to blame for that, too. They've been teaching and using NHST, even though all arguments point away from it.
But statisticians can't fix a bad design, because they rarely know the factors involved, and they can't fix errors in the methods, because they've got no idea about the subject matter. The statistician in your argument comes across as some kind of totem.
> There's nothing there.
There's something there, but since we don't know what, it's best to take it with a grain of salt. However, if even the bloody HR department looks at IQ scores, it gets a lot of attention. And one explanation is that it predicts better than nothing. If you have to choose between two candidates, and one has an IQ of 80 and the other of 120, you know who (on average) who fits best.
A score of 80 suggests a possible clinical issue with mental retardation. Few such people apply to roles who compete with people at average or above scores.
What is much more the case is people 95-145 "competing" with each other based, effectively, on what star sign they have.
The test probably breaks down at some level since it is hard to test higher intelligence, but it seems to me like it is still valid below about 120 IQ.
Something having an objective measure or not does not invalidate it.
But in any case, what we're talking about is the meter-ruler called "IQ" and its use by the most batshit HRish elements of soceity, and the most pseudo-scientific elements of psychology.
In a world where major employers are using IQ to guide their hiring practices, we're not talking about a quiz on the back of cosmo.
We're talking about a world where business (, uni,...) has outsourced its obligations to fairly consider the merits of individuals to the cult of psychometricians extremely happy to provide astrological justifications for ruining people's lives.
An entire medical establishment has been created by the IQ test, which exists across (at least the west) as a filter on entrants. What strange, bizarre, and often poorly sutied creatures have found themsleves in positions within this establishment?
When one looks around at the society the IQ test has created, one should be aghast. Why, so often, are nurses better than doctors? (etc. etc.)
What the evidence says is that IQ isn't the only factor, just as height isn't the only factor for NBA players. But just like height, IQ makes things a lot easier.
I'm still waiting for somebody to show me a prolific Math Phd with below average IQ. The only counter example I've heard people use it Feynman whose IQ was "only" 125 putting him smarter than "only" 95% of the population.
It rubs me the wrong way when Hawkins says stuff like "IQ is for losers" but then boasts how his physics undergrad degree was so easy for him he was just bored out of his mind (it sure wasn't easy for me). It's the intelligence equivalent of a billionaire saying you just need to work hard to get there, as if that was ever gonna make a difference if you're an Amazon factory worker.
Note, that when carear-IQ correlations are brought up it is universally in those populations subject to an IQ test filter who are then shown to correlate with IQ scores (ie., those who take, eg., MCAT, LSAT, ...) --- which, if it isnt clear, is circular.
Average and above IQ shows no correlation whatsoever with, eg., wealth.
Am I smarter than the average person? undoubtedly.
But if my IQ is high then I fear I'll avoid doing useful things because they're beneath me. And if my IQ is not high, I fear I'll avoid doing things because they're above me.
There is nothing useful that can come out of knowing your IQ, and as others have said, there's other things that are so much more important. Smart people are unusually good at deluding themselves, for example. They get so used to being right they start to believe if they can rationalize it, it's obviously true and anyone who disagrees isn't as smart.
Having said that, I once made a girl angry in college because I asked the professor if grad school will actually be challenging because undergrad math for me was ridiculously easy.
I think the best way to describe IQ is that it defines your potential (w/i a margin of error), but it's everything else that determines how effectively you use that IQ.
A child with down syndrome will never win a nobel no matter how much they want to or how much effort they put into it. But having an IQ of 160+ will never guarantee you don't end up homeless in a ditch.
Knowing my IQ would let me know if that's reasonable and if I have any kind of shot at it. I know I'm smarter than average, but am I smart enough to be a top scientist? If i'm too stupid to attain my dream and I went for a phd, I would just be wasting my time, my life, my earnings for a dead end. It would be like dedicating your whole life to being a pro basket-ball player while having no shot because you're 5'10" (taller than average, but not tall enough).
The one they settled on was a man in a wheelchair. Through technology they fixed all his ills.
They then put him on a ship with all the others and he was immediately attacked. It turned out there was a hierarchy and it had to do with physical violence. They wouldn't let you die and all injuries would be healed so it was safe, if painful, to do.
Throughout the book you learn the aliens that came to earth are very logical, by the book, run the numbers.
So this human realizes this and realizes he wants more control so he starts working his way thorugh the hierarchy. he gets to the 2nd highest rank, but cannot beat the highest rank alien, but he keeps trying ... and trying ... and trying. Finally the highest rank alien asks him why, he explains, the highest rank alien steps to the side and gives him the highest rank.
Later on in the story the aliens fighting the war decided the statistical odds weren't there and they were going to let all the worlds where they had gathered specimens be overrun. The crew on this ship with the humans rejected it, overtook the ship, and went to fight on their own. They did well enough on their own to tip the numbers just enough that the aliens fighting the war chose to re-engage.
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The point here is this. You cannot live life by the numbers, you'll be wrong because it doesn't take into account risk. I know you, and many others, will argue against that, but it's true.
Here's an example: Statistically speaking, you should never cross a busy highway. If your child is on the other side of that highway and in danger, you will 100% do it. Statistics can never take into account the reasons for the risk or the worthiness of the risk.
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The numbers are lying to you. Yes, there's a line at which you'll never be able to do better, but once you're past that line there's a large margin of error. Don't live your life afraid of that margin of error, embrace it.
Find me a below average height person who made it at the NBA or somebody, anybody, with a below average IQ who got a science Nobel prize and you'll have my attention. But if you have to rely on a pure fantasy novel to find a counter-example, it doesn't give me any confidence in your theory.
there, fixed that for you.
As for the rest ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_shortest_players_in_Na...
The shortest NBA player was 5'3" and played until 2001.
Isaiah Thomas is the shortest player to play in an all-star game at 5'9".
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But hey, good luck, I'm sure you're smarter than the rest of us and you'll do just fine without allegories.
Omg, no.
Good test taking skills will help someone score close to their theoretical maximum, but you can’t just train someone in test-taking skills and expect them to score at the top of the scale.
I’ve trained people on test-taking skills to great effect, but there is a limit (often significant) on how much these skills can improve a score.
[all North American cities](https://www.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/ym6ms5/a_map_of_ev...)
When/how is IQ ever used for good? Everyone I have ever talked to about it who talks about others' IQ intends to use those people for their own selfish purposes. And people I've talked to who talk about their own IQ only ever use it to brag, boast, or otherwise elevate themselves. Neither of these are behaviors that should be encouraged.
Generally this is not based on actual IQ test results, but on teachers impressions. And they keep "secret" which is the high IQ class. And if a kid is really motivated to be in the better class, change the kid to the other class (and vice-versa) if at all possible.
Of course this worked better with 15 kids-per-class than with the current 40 kids-per-class education system.
This is doing a lot of good, and has been for decades. Essentially it results in a smarter and more capable society, because people can be educated much closer to the limit of their abilities.
IQ tests are only a clincally valid test of extreme mental deficits. They do not correlate with objective measures of above-average performance, and have created a "metrical culture" with severe unethical concequences.
Fit a straight line, find a straight line.
Where IQ scores correlate, it's at the very-low-score end. It doesnt correlate with independent objective performance measures at average-and-above.
The people writing those papers are psychologists, not statisticians, and often the most poorly trained. Most of it is either circular pseudoscience or unreporducible. Indeed, for much of the IQ literature to be "unreporducible" would be a great credit, since it would mean it had a testable thesis -- which, largely, it never does.
The beginning and end of IQ research is, largely, just that straight-line rulers can draw straight lines in any dataset you put them against.