Inherited Intelligence

Factual Questions
41

Cooper,

You said ‘I’m not sure I saw where you disagreed with me. Basically you expressed frustration that what people mean by ‘intelligence’ is not better understood, defined and articulated…If it is your contention that IQ tests do not tell us anything relevant about a person’s intelligence, then I disagree.’

OK, where we disagree is that I say we can’t even define intelligence in a way that allows us to measure it. (Same for charisma.)

Is an intelligent person knowledgable?
Is an intelligent person well-organised?
Is an intelligent person accurate?
Is an intelligent person good at decisions?
Is an intelligent person good at scientific discoveries?
Is an intelligent person well educated?
Is an intelligent person sophisticated?

Now most of us are capable at some of the above, but not at others. Some of my friends:

  • rather stupid, but with a fantastic memory
  • brilliant scientist who is totally disorganised
  • great organiser, who can’t work a video

And we measure their PRECISE intelligence how?

This leads on to IQ tests. They are the only method of ‘measuring’ intelligence. How do we know IQ tests work? Well, they have to agree with our ‘instinctive’ feelings about people. Circular reasoning there - if the test agrees with our preconceptions, it’s a good test. Otherwise the test is flawed.

Does a person’s IQ change under any circumstances, and if so, what are they? For example, has anyone measured IQ of a control group at different ages? Indeed, has anyone measured the same group twice?
If you do a lot of IQ tests, does your IQ score improve? Does that mean that sitting IQ tests makes you more intelligent?

(In case you think I’m biased, I got an IQ result of 183 at age 8!)

Why doesn’t the sun come out at night when the light would be more useful? (Pratchett)

42

dlv,

I think it’s risky to dismiss people because of their views in other fields. Newton believed in astrology, but he still made valid scientific discoveries!

I ‘paraphrase’ you:

The problem with right-wingers in general is that they prefer to describe their vision of the world according to their theories/political views, as opposed to practical experiments and real-world observations.

Reagan (e.g. on economics), Thatcher (e.g. on the Poll tax), Hitler, etc

Why doesn’t the sun come out at night when the light would be more useful? (Pratchett)

43

Glee,

I dismiss Gould not because he’s an orthodox Marxist (I’ve known some Marxists who were otherwise reasonable people) but because he misrepresents the facts to fit his politically correct ideology, and has tried to ruin academic careers of those who disagreed with him.

44

Not true. Read Jensen’s G factor. He describes many experiments in which, e.g., he injected people with radioactive glucose and measured how long it took it to move around the brain as they solved problems; or measured the speed at which a signal traveled through one’s nerves; or analyzed encephalograms.

There are numerous tests that analyze a particular ‘kind of intelligence’ - Verbal SAT and math SAT are the most familiar example.

Not true. SATs are an excellent predictor of a student’s success in college. IQ scores correlate well with economic success in general, and success in fields that seem to require intelligence.

Of course they have, and if you don’t know this, then you’re really showing how much you know about the subject.

IQ in adults does change, and, interestingly, becomes more correlated to their parents IQ as they age.

Of course they have. You really don’t know what you’re talking about, do you?

45

A useful analogy to intelligence is the idea of “athleticism”. Athleticism involves how successfully one uses one’s body to cope with a lot of different situations, including some that are novel to one’s experience. Intelligence has almost the identical definition for the use of the mind, at least in colloquial English. Well, I don’t really want to argue that point, so I’ll qualify it more and say that’s the definition in my colloquial English.

So is athleticism inherited? Sure. But it is also a function of the training and nutrition a body receives, and it’s history (injuries, diseases suffered, etc.) Is intelligence inherited? Of course. Since it requires the functioning of a physical structure, the brain, whose detailed phenotype is at least partly genetically determined, how could it possibly NOT have a genetic component? But as with athleticism, it depends on training and history as well.

As for IQ tests measuring intelligence, imagine trying to create a test that would measure athleticism. You might test strength with, say, the bench press. You might measure coordination with throwing an object at a target, etc. You put someone through such a battery of tests and give a numerical score to the outcome. Is this a legitimate measure of athleticism? Well,…sort of. It’s certainly not UNrelated to athleticism, and Michael Jordan would surely score higher than Don Knotts. But is it good enough to adopt as a DEFINITION of athleticism? Probably not. Athletics is too diverse a concept to capture in such a test. Besides, Mr. Jordan would almost certainly score higher than Babe Ruth, too, yet he is nowhere near the baseball player Ruth was; so we are led to the question of what exactly is the point of measuring athleticism this way?

Completely analogous arguments hold for IQ tests. They are certainly not UNrelated to intelligence, but neither do they fully capture what is meant. And since humans use intelligence in so many different ways, what exactly is the point of measuring intelligence this way? With athleticism, there will be correlations between high test scores and performance on the playing field; with IQ there will be correlations between high test scores and performance in actual intellectual work. But they will be correlations only, and of limited use for prediction.

Another good thing about this analogy is that it shows how silly a lot of the criticisms often levelled at IQ tests are: that they are valueless because they are sensitive to education or cultural upbringing, for instance. This is analogous to saying that a test of athleticism is only valuable if it can somehow normalize out any physical training the subject may have done! Of course, we want to include the results of training in any test, right? Well…again, maybe, maybe not. It depends on the purpose of giving the test.

As for the OP, very few traits of the complexity of intelligence are controlled by a single gene. There may be genes that have a strong effect on intelligence, but there must be at least a gene complex influencing this trait. Like athleticism, the idea that intelligence could come from only one parent will not stand up to close scrutiny.

46

To Glee in response to Pratchett’s question: “Why doesn’t the sun come out at night when the light would be more useful?” (Pratchett)
Answer: Because it’s busy making light somewhere else, where the geese fly high by the sea la de do da…

47

dlv,

you posted ‘I dismiss Gould not because he’s an orthodox Marxist (I’ve known some Marxists who were otherwise reasonable people) but because he misrepresents the facts to fit his politically correct ideology, and has tried to ruin academic careers of those who disagreed with him.’

Tell us more!

Also you said ‘Jensen’s G factor…describes many experiments in which, e.g., he injected people with radioactive glucose and measured how long it took it to move around the brain as they solved problems; or measured the speed at which a signal traveled through one’s nerves; or analyzed encephalograms.’

So a faster speed of response shows you’re intelligent? Boxers have quick reflexes…

‘There are numerous tests that analyze a particular ‘kind of intelligence’ - Verbal SAT and math SAT are the most familiar example.’

Yes, I’m sure there’s a strong correlation between a maths SAT and doing well at maths. But the IQ test claim is that intelligence is ONE NUMBER. How do you assess a powerful mathematician with woeful verbal skills?

‘SATs are an excellent predictor of a student’s success in college. IQ scores correlate well with economic success in general, and success in fields that seem to require intelligence.’

So intelligence can be measured by economic success? What about William Sidis? (Cecil’s column). Also what fields seem to ‘require’ intelligence? You’re saying that IQ scores are a PRECISE indicator of intelligence because of fields that ‘seem’ to require it?

I asked ‘Does a person’s IQ change under any circumstances, and if so, what are they? For example, has anyone measured IQ of a control group at different ages?’

You replied ‘Of course they have, and if you don’t know this, then you’re really showing how much you know about the subject.
IQ in adults does change, and, interestingly, becomes more correlated to their parents IQ as they age.’

But if people’s IQ changes over time, what do you use as a base for their parent’s IQ? (which presumably has also changed over time)

I asked ‘Indeed, has anyone measured the same group twice?’

You posted ‘Of course they have. You really don’t know what you’re talking about, do you?’

Don’t confuse a request for information with stupidity! If, for example, some of the group’s intelligence changed considerably and also went both up and down, then what PRECISELY are we measuring?

48

According to Jensen, there are many factors that contribute to a higher IQ score. One of them is simply the speed at which one’s nerves transmit information, which varies among people and can be measured.

IQ is one number. You can devise tests that measure a particular aspect of intelligence. E.g., referring to the OP, women with Turner syndrom (a genetic anomaly) score as well as anyone else on most types of questions, but do terrible on problems that involve spacial skills. One of the many objections to SATs is that they reduce a complicated collection of abilities to too few measurements.

There’s no confusion in your case. :slight_smile:

49

dlv,

you don’t answer my questions!

You said ‘One of the many objections to SATs is that they reduce a complicated collection of abilities to too few measurements.’

And this differs from IQ tests how?

My points again:

  • if IQ scores vary with time, how do you compare people? (and their parents)

  • there is no standard to measure the result of an IQ test against

What’s your IQ? :slight_smile:

Why doesn’t the sun come out at night when the light would be more useful? (Pratchett)

50

IQ is even worse (than SATs) becuse it attempts to aggergate several distinct factors into a single measurement.

51

Teachers, psychologists and like pros to not use IQ as a single number (quoted from above or below:But the IQ test claim is that intelligence is ONE NUMBER. How do you assess a powerful mathematician with woeful verbal skills?

BUT(a big one)a kid with fantastic math skills(160) and woeful verbal skills(90) might not be a valuable to the community as one with flat verbal(140) and math skills(140). What good is a great mathematician who can’t express what he has found? Can’t read and understand the great work done before him? Can’t solve word problems - don’t laugh, this is not that uncommon.

Oh, I’m gonna keep using these #%@&* codes 'til I get 'em right.