Can a really clever guy score really low on a IQ test?

[fishmonkey]

making a rough determination of struggling versus not struggling is very different from using the results to make an ordinal ranking of individuals...

[jsg4z]

Q1. Consider a room which contains, two fathers, a brother, two sons, an uncle, and a nephew. What is the fewest number of people there could be in the room?

2

you win! sorry i don't have any fancy prizes. maybe ableton will donate a Live v1.0 license

[jsg4z]

making a rough determination of struggling versus not struggling is very different from using the results to make an ordinal ranking of individuals...

A test that results in one of two scores(pass, fail) is a poor test designed by someone(hopefully) with that goal. Or else like I said they are retarded too.

IQ tests are designed to distinguish very high functioning people from average and low...a very wide range of results.

[fishmonkey]

making a rough determination of struggling versus not struggling is very different from using the results to make an ordinal ranking of individuals...

A test that results in one of two scores(pass, fail) is a poor test designed by someone(hopefully) with that goal. Or else like I said they are retarded too.

IQ tests are designed to distinguish very high functioning people from average and low...a very wide range of results.

yes, but to what level is it valid to draw conclusions about the ordering of individuals on such a scale???

what is at issue here is the interpretation of the results, and if it is actually valid to draw particular conclusions from a particular test... the same principle applies with any kind of measurement... if i measure the length of my middle finger with a wooden ruler, it is absurd for me to say that it is 8.32756mm long...

with intelligence tests, there is an inherent tension between the goal of obtaining a high level of reliability (i.e. the same results are returned over and over), versus a high level of validity (i.e. the test actually assesses what it purports to)... to obtain high levels of both requires a fairly narrow interpretation of what 'intelligence' really is...

[jsg4z]

you're right, the quality of the test will dictate the quality of the results. but saying that its impossible to create a test of sufficient quality is ignorant.

[Machinesworking]

you're right, the quality of the test will dictate the quality of the results. but saying that its impossible to create a test of sufficient quality is ignorant.

Again at what goal though? At some point a person who is skilled in a science or art, or who is highly creative in that science or art will be recognized. To distinguish a scale that says "A is more intelligent than B" with no real way of knowing the actual ability of a person to apply that intelligence is in many ways closing in on eugenics and social darwinism. In light of that, the way it stands with simple tests that measure only a persons ability to learn are enough, further prodding down this path does nothing IMO to help humanity, or more precisely humanities compassion.

To a large degree I think a test for emotional intelligence would prove to be a better thing to focus on, but guess what? Doesn't even enter the discussion.

[fishmonkey]

you're right, the quality of the test will dictate the quality of the results. but saying that its impossible to create a test of sufficient quality is ignorant.

the point is that no test can ever be 'objective'...

every kind of test is biased according to what is considered desirable, as well as by the statistical procedures used to massage the numbers...

[fishmonkey]

you're right, the quality of the test will dictate the quality of the results. but saying that its impossible to create a test of sufficient quality is ignorant.

Again at what goal though? At some point a person who is skilled in a science or art, or who is highly creative in that science or art will be recognized. To distinguish a scale that says "A is more intelligent than B" with no real way of knowing the actual ability of a person to apply that intelligence is in many ways closing in on eugenics and social darwinism. In light of that, the way it stands with simple tests that measure only a persons ability to learn are enough, further prodding down this path does nothing IMO to help humanity, or more precisely humanities compassion.

To a large degree I think a test for emotional intelligence would prove to be a better thing to focus on, but guess what? Doesn't even enter the discussion.

bingo, check out the American father of intelligence testing:

http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/goddard.shtml

various researchers are looking at emotional intelligence, creativity, expertise, etc. but they are certainly in the minority...

[jsg4z]

a test of logic and reason is objective by definition. there are right and wrong answers. like this question:

Q1. Consider a room which contains, two fathers, a brother, two sons, an uncle, and a nephew. What is the fewest number of people there could be in the room?


if you pose a sufficient number of questions of varying degrees of difficulty you can order the subjects in terms of intellectual prowess.

ie some kids are dumb and some are smart. its quantitative, not qualitative.

problem is that parents dont like it.

[Machinesworking]

a test of logic and reason is objective by definition. there are right and wrong answers. like this question:

Q1. Consider a room which contains, two fathers, a brother, two sons, an uncle, and a nephew. What is the fewest number of people there could be in the room?


if you pose a sufficient number of questions of varying degrees of difficulty you can order the subjects in terms of intellectual prowess.

ie some kids are dumb and some are smart. its quantitative, not qualitative.

problem is that parents dont like it.

Personally I think you're over simplifying it. For instance a mensa couple adopted a kid to prove that intelligence is learned, that the ability to learn at a fast rate is environmental, not genetic. It's not science until 100,000 mensa parents adopt orphans and have them graduate high school at 11 or so, (which their adopted kid did, not surprisingly enough) etc. but the point that they were trying to make I firmly believe, that putting quantitative values on intelligence leads to thinking in terms of eugenics and flat statements like some kids are smart, some are dumb.
People love absolutes, and scientists do as well, but the problem is the human mind is much more flexible than that. I guarantee you that if you put an average person with no mental issues through a blindingly confusing psych test, told them they were a genius, then proceeded to surround them with intelligent people, and sent them back to school. That if they had no major insecurity issues and other threats to the process, they would do far better than they ever did before, and very likely would do far better on IQ tests.

[Machinesworking]

bingo, check out the American father of intelligence testing:

http://www.indiana.edu/~intell/goddard.shtml

various researchers are looking at emotional intelligence, creativity, expertise, etc. but they are certainly in the minority...

I personally think eugenics is the last institution of the feeble minded. Bell curves and all that shit are ways for people to hold up their own race or family as being somehow above the common folk, it's pathetic at best. It's also no surprise that the IQ tests biggest proponents were all eugenics fans. If you believe that some people are born smarter than others, then you're buying into eugenic thinking. Think about what kool aid you decide to swallow and who is serving it to you before you drink, if he looks like Elvis a bit and answers to the name Jim, might not be a good idea to swallow.

[fishmonkey]

a test of logic and reason is objective by definition. there are right and wrong answers. like this question:

Q1. Consider a room which contains, two fathers, a brother, two sons, an uncle, and a nephew. What is the fewest number of people there could be in the room?


if you pose a sufficient number of questions of varying degrees of difficulty you can order the subjects in terms of intellectual prowess.

ie some kids are dumb and some are smart. its quantitative, not qualitative.

problem is that parents dont like it.

actually, what you are testing is people's ability to reason in certain ways, whether that makes them smart or dumb is completely a matter of definition and interpretation...

back to the kids at school example, in a study a while back (one that would never pass ethics approval now), researchers gave an intelligence test to a class, and afterwards told the teachers which students were 'gifted' (or not) according to the results...

in a follow up study (i think it was a year or more later), it was found that the 'gifted' students were doing much better at school than the 'non-gifted'... the only thing is, the researchers had arbitrarily chosen which students were 'smart', and which were not...

the conclusion from this study is that it was the teachers expectations of which kids were smarter that caused them to reinforce this belief with their teaching methods and amount of attention given to particular students... note that the students themselves were not given the results, only the teachers...

[Machinesworking]

actually, what you are testing is people's ability to reason in certain ways, whether that makes them smart or dumb is completely a matter of definition and interpretation...

back to the kids at school example, in a study a while back (one that would never pass ethics approval now), researchers gave an intelligence test to a class, and afterwards told the teachers which students were 'gifted' (or not) according to the results...

in a follow up study (i think it was a year or more later), it was found that the 'gifted' students were doing much better at school than the 'non-gifted'... the only thing is, the researchers had arbitrarily chosen which students were 'smart', and which were not...

the conclusion from this study is that it was the teachers expectations of which kids were smarter that caused them to reinforce this belief with their teaching methods and amount of attention given to particular students... note that the students themselves were not given the results, only the teachers...

Nurture is so much more important than nature, it's crazy to me that people even try to point to genes as a major player in this.

[fishmonkey]

i would say that genetics and environment play a part...

whether we should make judgments and decisions based on genetics is an ethical question, leading directly to eugenics...

i certainly agree that focusing on the role of environment is a more enlightened viewpoint...

and anyway, would the world really be a better place if it was filled with people who score highly on conventional 'intelligence' tests that favour Western cultural biases???

[disco judas]

"Your example of Einstein is good in the sense that he really didn't become recognized as a 'genius' until later in life. Who knows for instance how long it took him to come up with his theories? He could have a had a slow adaptability capacity, and a huge ability to look at the bigger picture. "


He had a slow adaptability capacity. He did not start talking before he was 4