I just love how many people on the Internet have amazingly high IQs and don’t seem to realize just how exceedingly rare they are. I was reading the profile of a woman on OKCupid who writes “you should message me if your IQ is at least 153 (not an arbitrary number) …”
I was curious why she picked that particular (and very high) number so I sent her the following message:
Her response:
Hoo boy, 185! You’d think a person in the 99.9999983473th percentile of IQs would know basic statistics well enough to realize that there are only ~112 people on a planet of 6.8 billion with an IQ of 185 or above (assuming the Weschler test, computed using a z-score of 5.67)
I couldn’t help myself sending a mildly snarky reply mentioning how I look forward to her solution to string theory being published and winning the Nobel Prize in short order - I don’t expect her to message me again. Good for a laugh though.
I would have written back to tell her that I’m sorry, but I can’t date anyone who uses comma splices. And that it’s really too bad, considering my 186 IQ and all.
I even gave this phenomenon the name Shagnasty’s Principle here. It happens everywhere IQ comes up. The race heats up so fast that in a matter of minutes or hours, you are looking at a group people who scored among the highest in history and somehow they all managed to be at the same place at the same time. Weird.
Oooh, I was looking for you in the ‘‘Gifted Children - Where Are You Now?’’ thread. I thought you were Stranger on a Train, but I remembered we had an IQ expert here.
I had a question about the IQ scores of children. Do they accurately predict the IQ scores of adults?
Aw that’s OK Kayla. I automatically respect you a lot more for saying as much than anyone else on the Internet that claims to have a ridiculously inflated IQ.
Now now sweety, don’t you worry. Just follow me, we got us a special little corner of the dope for us dummies. We have padding on all the corners of the tables and we cut down the chair legs so when we fall off we don’t get hurt. Next week is my turn to bring cookies!
I’ve never had my IQ tested. Where would I go to do that? I’m sure I can find a billion online tests but how do I know that the test is accurate? I can imagine myself coming back with a high score and being excited only to find that I used the wrong tool.*
*Now I’m imagining two men in a dick measuring contest:
“Wow, I’ve got a 30 inch penis!”
“You’re using the centimeter side.”
“No, I’m not!”
Average IQ is 100 on a Normal Curve so 50% are above, 50% below. 1 StDev is 15 points. So if you have an IQ of 115 means 84% of the population are below your level.
Move out to 130 and 97.7% of the population is below you.
The 99th percentile corresponds to a z-score of ~2.58 so with a standard deviation of 15 that would be a score of 138. A high score but on the Dope, totally believable. 185 on the other hand has a z-score of ~5.67 making it way, way off the charts to the point of absurdity. Depending on the test I think the accuracy of the measurement really starts to break down after 140 or so anyway.
Isn’t IQ also age-based? IE, a measurement of your mental development in relation to other people your age? It’s possible that some people report IQ scores they received during childhood (often for tests to see if they fit into a ‘gifted and talented education’ program), because their brains developed faster. As a kid I reported a genius IQ but I’d eat my hat if that’s still true. I mean, not really, hats taste horrible, but I seriously doubt I am a genius.
I did a study on the percentage of Dopers who have been on Jeopardy versus what could be expected if our distribution matched the population as a whole. We were about two orders of magnitude higher than expected. I didn’t test for significance. I suspect there is a strong bias here against people with relatively low IQs participating - especially in IQ threads.
I’m curious about what it said in her profile. What does she do? If she is correct about communication across IQ gaps, she must be pretty lonely. And I didn’t think Marilyn vos Savant was on the dating market.
