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Can you make yourself smarter?

nytimes.com

11–20 of 55 posts

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#11
Superficially, the answer to this question is, obviously, yes. We reason spatially and with mental simulation, but we also reason by applying the linguistic conventions learned from our culture (e.g., "if this statement were false, then ...").

What most people seem to fail to realize is just how different people are from each other cognitively, and how many different ways there are of getting to a particular conclusion. "Intelligence" is like a country's GDP -- a complicated, non-stationary mess that, taken together and measured in a way our culture deems important, ends up representing our "Gross Cognitive Product".

So, dual n-back probably improves working memory in most people, which will probably improve their problem solving ability, most of the time. But there are, without a doubt, many other subtle, complicated, and idiosyncratic aspects of cognition that are likely to have far more dramatic effects if appropriately tweaked.

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#12
While I can't read the article. My answer to this question was always along the lines of "Oh I'm sure you can, but the problem is that thanks to the Dunning-Kruger effect, dumb people won't feel that they need to put in the effort to get smarter."

So the smart get smarter and the dumb get dumber; so to speak.

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#14

The scientific evidence for Dual N Back improving fluid intelligence is actually fairly weak as far as I can tell, see this critique and the other studies discussed: http://www.gwern.net/DNB%20FAQ#criticism My personal theory is that solving difficult math and programming problems is a better use of time than doing working memory training exercises. I'd guess that solving math and programming problems improve working…

That's a brutal critique which comes close to a charge of scientific fraud. I'd be curious to see a response. If there isn't one, I know what to think.

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#15
I did some moderately serious dual n-backing a year or so back in an effort to improve my chess game. Of course it wasn't a remotely scientific experiment so I can't tell if it really helped, but I did feel that my ability to concentrate increased, if not my ability to reason. I felt more able to take a breath after working out a variation and take a few seconds to really concentrate on the final (imagined) position and scrutinize it for tricks.

(My USCF rating did go up fairly significantly around then but it's no proof of any causation, plus I was doing plenty of other things at the same time to increase my chess results anyway.)

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#16
post #8

The scientific evidence for Dual N Back improving fluid intelligence is actually fairly weak as far as I can tell, see this critique and the other studies discussed: http://www.gwern.net/DNB%20FAQ#criticism My personal theory is that solving difficult math and programming problems is a better use of time than doing working memory training exercises. I'd guess that solving math and programming problems improve working…

In this book http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0141035501/ the author says that solving simple math equations (addition,subtraction ,division) fast is much more stimulating than doing complex math.

And the argument and evidence he provides is what?

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#17
post #2

Not yet HN ready and I wanted to post this later . I have been working on a HTML 5 implementation , If you want to try the tasks mentioned. http://alpha.brainturk.com the chein task can be found here http://alpha.brainturk.com/chein Please let me know your suggestions on how to improve this . I need to make a few more changes for this to be played on ipad but for now works with the keyboard

Keep going with this! I was just playing multiplication asteroids and there is a little lag between when I "die" and when the game over comes up so I can get an extra 2 or 3 answers in. Also, would it be possible to show lives remaining in asteroids?

I'd make the instructions pop up at first or at least make the link a little more prominent. I struggled with how to play the color game at first and it took me a minute to find the instructions.

The games are fun and I could see them being used for brain training or even just as teaching aids for middle school aged children.

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#18

Their sidebar explaining IQ scores seems a little silly. I'd like to see a citations for average scores of Nobel prize winners. Also, who went back in time to administer an intelligence test to Mozart?

IQ is just defined in terms of standard deviations. Having an IQ of 130 means you are 3 standard deviations smarter than average, i.e. in the 99.7th percentile. Presumably, they just put Motzart in the top 99.xxxxxx% percentile by guess and calculated the resulting IQ.

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#19
post #2

Not yet HN ready and I wanted to post this later . I have been working on a HTML 5 implementation , If you want to try the tasks mentioned. http://alpha.brainturk.com the chein task can be found here http://alpha.brainturk.com/chein Please let me know your suggestions on how to improve this . I need to make a few more changes for this to be played on ipad but for now works with the keyboard

Keep going with this! I was just playing multiplication asteroids and there is a little lag between when I "die" and when the game over comes up so I can get an extra 2 or 3 answers in. Also, would it be possible to show lives remaining in asteroids? I'd make the instructions pop up at first or at least make the link a little more prominent. I struggled with how to play the color game at first and it took me a minute…

Yes that will be a small fix to show the lives and as far as the instructions popping up first that is something I thought about but now that you mention it too I think that will be added next

Re: Can you make yourself smarter?

#20
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this book http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0141035501/ the author says that solving simple math equations (addition,subtraction ,division) fast is much more stimulating than doing complex math.

And the argument and evidence he provides is what?

I do not have that book with me now but he provides brain scans in the experiments he conducted, most of the book is just exercises (math equations , stroop color and word recall)
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