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IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

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Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#121

Post by amazingman »

xupybd wrote: post #36

I have no way to navigate this, I've heard psychologists claim that IQ is the most well proven concept in the social sciences. Now this guy comes along saying the complete opposite. Anyone have any advice on how to weight this up and figure out what the truth is?

Ignore Taleb, he’s a self-appointed expert among “charlatans” in every topic he’s ever encountered. The sheer hubris of the man is breathtaking.

Every once in a while he’s correct about something important. At this point, though, it seems like those times are basically accidents.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#122

Post by kokokokoko »

nabla9 wrote: post #77

>If you want to detect how someone fares at a task, say loan sharking, tennis playing, or random matrix theory, make him/her do that task; we don’t need theoretical exams for a real world function by probability-challenged psychologists. If you want to measure skill and experience, that's good advice. When you want to measure the ability to solve problems where the individual or nobody has skill or experience yet, yo…

And anecdotely, IQ style testing has been by far the most determinant data point for successful software developer hires in my experience. I'm almost at the point where I might start to believe it is more important than domain knowledge of programming.

This is likely because the type of work I typically hire for has a large amount of problem solving and troubleshooting as opposed higher level system design. Which is essentially what IQ tests test for.

The world "intelligence" is just a very loaded word and means different things to different people. IQ tests show how well a person can solve puzzles and make connections between systems. Which many consider to be a sign of intelligence. But not everyone.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#123

Post by alexashka »

waynecochran wrote: post #19

I have been afraid to take an IQ test for the fear of finding out that I am not very smart. In any case, the current hubbub of folks speaking against IQ tests seems to be more of a idealogical reaction to what IQ tests are telling us. OTOH, this guy seems to be legit. Truth is so hard to find these days.

I remember having similar feelings. In hindsight, I was right, and also, it's made very little difference once I got out into the real world.

The number of people who use their brains for more than getting a better paycheque is small, shockingly so. If you look up the people who've made all the popular javascript libraries of the past decade as one small example - you'll see that none of them are geniuses. They just had an itch that needed scratching. If you have that much, you're way ahead of the game, don't worry about the rest.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#124

Post by JumpCrisscross »

ordu wrote: post #108
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being “smart” implies there’s a set of “un-smart” kids On the flip side, trusting in my intelligence let me persist on problems even when others said they were lost causes. If everyone is equally smart and all that matters is hard work, it doesn’t make much sense to work on different problems from others. (Or on problems others deem to be unworthy.) This leads to a monoculture. At the end of the day, if you have a…

If I understand you, you are arguing that parents should praise their kids for smartness because it helps kids to understand that they are smarter? But there is not point doing that, if they are smarter they will figure it theirselves. At the same time if parents are praising them for smartness it would lead smartness to become a part of self-esteem and therefore their psychological well being will be tied with their…

> you are arguing that parents should praise their kids for smartness because it helps kids to understand that they are smarter?

I’m arguing for truthfulness. If your kid is smart, don’t shy from saying so. If they excel in other ways, point those out. Helping us to understand our strengths and weaknesses is a gift parents can give.

> if self-esteem of a person based on working hard it is very good

Not necessarily. It can lead to being a grunt. That’s fine if that makes one happy. But many innovations have been sprung from a combination of intelligence and laziness.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#125

Post by thaumaturgy »

jdietrich wrote: post #56

Frankly, I'm incredibly disappointed in Taleb's recent writing. This article is one of many where the actual point being made is buried beneath unnecessary and divisive ad-hominem attacks. Does the caption "Mensa members: typically high “IQ” losers in Birkenstocks." usefully contribute to a serious, scholarly conversation on IQ? Is it reasonable or fair-minded to immediately tar opponents to your argument as racists,…

For every one person who would rather have a scholarly debate about anything, there are at least a hundred who want some dessert reading, or want to be entertained, or want to get in a fight. A lot of well-respected authors distinguished themselves by not being boring.

I usually use a dry tone on HN because it's a place that's particularly prone to petty pretendo-debate-club arguments, and being boring reduces the chances of getting caught in one of those, which I don't enjoy. But the more entertaining personalities here get a lot more attention.

And fwiw his description of Mensans doesn't seem totally off the mark.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#126

Post by yourapostasy »

dqpb wrote: post #12
barrkel wrote: post #4

IQ is undoubtedly overemphasized by some factions, especially those with an axe to grind and a dog whistle to blow, if it helps them feel less guilty about their position in the world or otherwise rationalizes injustice. OTOH there's definitely a difference between people, people who aren't mentally defective, people that are quick on the uptake, sharp and alert, who adapt to new mental models. IQ might be an unscien…

I'll admit I spend probably greater than average time brooding over how dumb most people are. But I don't think this is inherent in those people. I think it's mostly a result of their prior knowledge, sleep, energy level, stress/anxiety, and give-a-shit. I think most people are fundamentally capable of great intelligence.

> I think most people are fundamentally capable of great intelligence.

If the real world distribution of IQ closely approximates the Gaussian distribution IQ tests are meant to model, then in the US alone there are about 44 million people in the range from about 70-85. World wide, about 1 billion people in that cohort of 1-2 standard deviations. Even if actual real world results are half of what the models predict, we're still talking really large numbers of people.

Finding ways to bring them up to "just" average intelligence would be astounding for the species, and I'd aim for that first instead of setting ourselves up for failure by defining a goal of "great intelligence".

Right now, the best we can prescribe with even a semblance of consistent results is intensive educational intervention and family assistance from early childhood onward. Actually doing that in our current economic model would be on the order of ditching the MIC and somehow transferring the spending to those activities. That's a pipe dream with current established stakeholders.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#127

Post by LordDragonfang »

pps43 wrote: post #66
barrkel wrote: post #4

IQ is undoubtedly overemphasized by some factions, especially those with an axe to grind and a dog whistle to blow, if it helps them feel less guilty about their position in the world or otherwise rationalizes injustice. OTOH there's definitely a difference between people, people who aren't mentally defective, people that are quick on the uptake, sharp and alert, who adapt to new mental models. IQ might be an unscien…

The point Taleb is making is that IQ works well in the lower half of the distribution, but not in the upper half. Which makes sense, considering that questions for IQ tests are created by people with close to average intelligence. Imagine third-graders writing college-level math tests, or beginner chess players coming up with chess problems to separate masters from grandmasters.

>questions for IQ tests are created by people with close to average intelligence

Is this really the case? I would expect the opposite to be true, that people with high IQs and specifically organizations like MENSA that select based on IQ would have a vested interest in being involved in that process.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#128

Post by FakeComments »

mikemotherwell wrote: post #32
barrkel wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IQ is definitely not a good measure of value, contribution, quality of thought. I think it's probably correlated, and for some contributions may be a gating factor, but I've seen plenty of smart people examining the wrong things, for sure. Meta-analysis of focus doesn't seem to come free with IQ. I think it's a skill.

IQ is an EXCELLENT measure of "value, contribution, quality of thought". The idea it isn't is weird to me. What IQ fails at is being an ABSOLUTE measure of those things, e.g. John Nash is a genius, but his schizophrenia likely made a lot of what he did and said questionable. Just taking IQ and ignoring other factors would lead you awry. Even then, John Nash came up with the Nash Equilibrium. I think the mistake is th…

I think it’s often understated what you say in your last paragraph:

If success has multiple parts with a non-linear relationship (“more than the sum of its parts”), then we’d expect to see decreasing utility for IQ relative to having a strong secondary or tertiary talent — eg, strong leadership skills and EQ, so you can build momentum around your idea. In many senses, this is what we mean by a “well rounded person”.

I’m not sure how that translates into the rant that IQ is useless, pseudoscience, etc. that Mr Taleb makes, though.

Let’s look at height and NBA success. I think most of us agree distance is a measure, but it doesn’t explain NBA success. Just like IQ, it only really explains NBA non-success with much strength: there are very few successful short NBA players, and no midget ones; however, there are many non-NBA playing tall people.

Naively, Mr Taleb seems to be arguing that height isn’t a real measurement because it doesn’t account for basketball skill.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#129

Post by samatman »

LordDragonfang wrote: post #120
asabjorn wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the SAT test wasn't selective in some meaningful way then people admitted through affirmative action should be expected to do approximately as well as the people that was admitted purely through merit. The outcome says otherwise [1], or if prefer a video [2]. Mismatching people to schools based upon an ideal hurts those people when they come unprepared relative to their peers. Many diverse people admitted through…

Focussing on "affirmative action" feels uncomfortably close to the exact kind of dog whistling this article criticized up front. As I understand it, most colleges have been using some form of linear regression model on many factors to filter admissions in a way that maximize returns (i.e. alumni donations) for decades now. Surely there is other evidence which shows that if SAT scores were actually a poor heuristic of…

He didn't bring race into the conversation; you did.

Affirmative action is precisely an adjustment of admissions criteria such that ceterus paribus a candidate is more likely to be admitted. Yes, it's based on race, but if it was based on lottery, it would have the same effect: students with lower SAT scores are admitted to schools which otherwise require a certain threshold.

That they don't do as well, shows that the SAT is measuring something relevant to success in education.

Note that affirmative action would have this effect even if average IQ were the same across races, because schools vary in the SAT thresholds they set, and this would have the effect of propelling students into settings they aren't prepared to flourish in.

Re: IQ is largely a pseudoscientific swindle

#130

Post by tomp »

ordu wrote: post #108
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Being “smart” implies there’s a set of “un-smart” kids On the flip side, trusting in my intelligence let me persist on problems even when others said they were lost causes. If everyone is equally smart and all that matters is hard work, it doesn’t make much sense to work on different problems from others. (Or on problems others deem to be unworthy.) This leads to a monoculture. At the end of the day, if you have a…

If I understand you, you are arguing that parents should praise their kids for smartness because it helps kids to understand that they are smarter? But there is not point doing that, if they are smarter they will figure it theirselves. At the same time if parents are praising them for smartness it would lead smartness to become a part of self-esteem and therefore their psychological well being will be tied with their…

But what's wrong with basing one's self-esteem on being smart, if someone is smart?
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