81–90 of 292 posts
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> We do have concrete ways to measure intelligence, and have had them for over a hundred years. Concrete, yes. Accurate, absolutely not. Any number of people have exploited the systematic errors in I.Q. testing for purely racist and political objectives. > The literature on this subject is quite extensive. Indeed it is: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Mismeasure_of_Man
Gould has been exposed as a fraud.
Saying "Children aren't born smart" is equivalent to saying "Intelligence is determined entirely by one's environment", if I understand the claim correctly. While I'm sure talking to ones children contributes in a massively positive way to their IQ, I think it's extremely inaccurate and ignorant to the existence of real-world outliers to claim that it's the only factor. To provide just one example (out of many, I'm s…
This is a useless nitpick. It's not a scientific treatise, it's a public service message to try to change people's behavior. I don't believe for a second that the doctor believes that intelligence has no inherited component whatsoever. She is dealing with a problem in the real world using what tools she has at her disposal. Edit: Responding jamesaguilar's and true_religion's point about the title. Yes, that's true. I…
If we "simply can't know" what the point is, then how do you decide what's relevant?
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We do have concrete ways to measure intelligence, and have had them for over a hundred years. The literature on this subject is quite extensive.
What's "intelligence"?
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How did the researchers determine causation? What if there is simply a gene for strong language which is responsible both for the parents' financial success and the child's academic success, and the extra words were simply a by product?
> How did the researchers determine causation? What if there is simply a gene for strong language which is responsible both for the parents' financial success and the child's academic success, and the extra words were simply a by product? Yes, it might well be the classic confusion of cause and effect, but your argument will have no effect on the OP, who is a psychologist. For reasons that may or may not be obvious,…
My boss's son is one of the smartest 18 month old kids I have ever met. He communication levels are through the roof, and for words he might not be able to say, or things he might not be able to express, he knows rudimentary sign language to communicate, e.g., he has a hand signal for "I'm tired" or "I'm hungry" -- he almost never has to cry to show he needs something. It's really quite impressive.
Do you have children? I know ostensibly that is irrelevant but what you're describing is good and impressive but it's probably not as uncommon as you think. Baby sign language is pretty popular in the parenting world. Actually, many babies can do that at much earlier ages. Not to detract anything, just saying ... :)
Father of a 3.5 year old brought up using tons of "targeted talking" here: our son has a vocabulary and logical comprehension skills that are significantly beyond his peer group. As a result I'd noticed in the past that he prefers engaging with other adults in conversation over kids his age. Yesterday was his first PTA meeting and the feedback from his teacher seemed to confirm it too. She narrated an incident when t…
"Daddy? Why does the firecracker go up?" "That's a very interesting question! Why don't we try to find out. Let's remove individual parts of the firecracker one at a time and find out what makes it go!"
I have some smart kids. I believe this very much. I have a 9yo 2yo and a newborn.
Both my 9 and 2yo are very smart, however, there is an important piece to this that needs comment: Teaching your children attention discipline. I have been using computers daily since 3rd grade. I am 38 years old. I have chronic ADHD.
It is important to engage your kids conversationally from the time they are born, but to also ensure they can sit and focus. WIth my older daughter, this was accomplished by requiring reading sessions and zero screen time daily.
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It's the thing that blank slatists say can be improved by a better environment when they're not busy claiming that it can't be measured.
So you don't actually want to address a legitimate question.