Time-scales

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, "Brad Walsh"
> >It's important to remember that, by definition, a person average
> >intelligence has an IQ of 100. Therefor, by definition, a large
> >fraction of the population will always have an IQ under 100 --
even if
> >every single individual is actually smarter than Einstein.
>
> It's at least as important to remember that the whole IQ test
business goes
> back almost 100 years, and has hardly been updated since.

Depends how you define "hardly" I guess.

The quantitative
> nature of the IQ score leads people to believe that intelligence
is a
> precisely measurable phenomenon, like mass or velocity.

Practitioners don't hold that belief. Does the science become
invalidated because it is misconstrued by the uninformed?

In truth
> intelligence is probably much more complex,

Very true.

and IQ testing is probably
> comparable to trying sum up countries or galaxies with a single
integer, and
> claiming that that integer completes differentiates among
countries or
> galaxies.

A practitioner wouldn't make that claim. Differentiating at the
margin is always a difficult process, but the differences between
S.D. are quite profound. Applying the results to individuals poses
some problematic issues, but when aggregated and studied with
statistical error accounted for, fairly consistent societal trends
emerge, so that claims made do have substance.

Even 12 year old boys get that rating girls on a 1-10 scale is an
> oversimplification. So why for heaven's sake would a bunch of
people who
> claimed to be of well above average intelligence buy such a cheesy
notion at
> all?
>
> Brad W.
> IQ 135, but who gives a sh_t

How many of your friends have IQs below 85? If it doesn't measure
anything and all people are equal then you'd think that there would
be hardly any societal stratification when IQ was controlled for. If
it's cheesy then there shouldn't be any demonstrable correlation
between what's measured and other factors, should there?

TangoMan