Boris Johnson's IQ comment
01 Dec 2013, 1:33 pm
MCalavera wrote:
XFilesGeek wrote:
fibonaccispiral777 wrote:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25135225
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
Don't care.
"Intelligence" is an arbitrary concept that means whatever whomever is talking about wants it to mean. Usually, people will just cling to whatever definition of "intelligence" most closely matches their own profile of cognitive abilities. In terms of social "worth," there's a lot more to a person's economic "value" than a number on an IQ test. Being "successful" has been shown to depend on many more factors than just IQ (and it's debatable if IQ is even the most important factor).
Personally, I think it's just one more example of social posturing by monkeys who are trying to grab more resources for themselves.
Disregarding your last statement, this is exactly what I believe.
Sorry about that, I'm feeling a tad grumpy today.
In any case, thanks for all the links you're posting. I'm too lazy to bother.
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Mummy_of_Peanut
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01 Dec 2013, 1:38 pm
From what Boris Johnson has said, I can assume he believes he is one of those with a high IQ and that's how he's become successful. That's hilarious. The term 'educated beyond his intelligence' springs to mind. Anyone who knows anything about him knows he came to our attention due to his gaffs and for being the butt of jokes, when he appeared on 'Have I Got News for You'.
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01 Dec 2013, 2:49 pm
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
MCalavera wrote:
Yes, some experts prefer to restrict the definition to a very narrow range of mental/cognitive abilities that seem to fit under one neat category, but what about social intelligence and the sorts?
Social intelligence and emotional intelligence are more or less the same thing. Here is the link to the full study from my previous example of emotional intelligence. As demonstrated within, the two are often used interchangeably.
http://www.decisionneurosciencelab.org/ ... nss124.pdf
My disagreement has nothing to do with whether or not emotional and "traditional" intelligence work together. This study you link to demonstrates that they, indeed, work together and are not as distinct as is commonly believed to be (I'm sure Gardner himself would agree with this as well). However, this does not mean that, therefore, they must all unquestionably be lumped into one single category.
They are not "unquestionably being lumped" into one single category. Psychometric g has been studied and refined through thousands of scientific studies for 88 years since the concept was introduced in 1925. It is because these studies validate the concept of general intelligence that the concept is used, not because they lack the capacity for critical inquiry of MCalavera.
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
And g is not a "very narrow range" of mental/cognitive abilities. It is the exact opposite: If a task involves the use of mental ability (be it math, language, music, humor), then performance on that task is very likely to be correlated with g.
I'm going to have to do some research on this to see how accurate your claim here really is. But either way, there are many examples that show that unifying them all into one overall intelligence does little to explain why people often display different relative levels of adeptness for different skills/abilities/intelligences.
Savants are one good example. People with autism are another. As you mentioned, psychopaths as well. And many other examples.
Anecdotes, anecdotes, anecdotes. All of these groups make up very small portions of the human population. It would be scientifically fraudulent to base one's opinion about IQ on the study of these groups. This is rudimentary statistics.
MCalavera wrote:
Also, why is it that IQ tests test for more than one subcategory of general intelligence if they may as well be all under one category instead? And why is it, when doing IQ or other similar tests, that some people score low on verbal intelligence but score quite high on quantitative (or math-related) intelligence?
*sigh*.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Factor_analysis
And your concept of "some people" seems to be entirely arbitrary. There is a reason why scientists use statistical tests, you know?
MCalavera wrote:
For the academic STAT test (similar to IQ test), I scored very low on verbal (percentile rank below 50) but got an extremely high score on quantitative (in the high 90s). Even if I am an outlier in this case, this does suggest that the theory of one intelligence is too simplistic to account for these discrepancies. And some explanation is needed.
Also, consider Broca's aphasia and Wernicke's aphasia. Why is it that when one part of the brain is damaged, only one or two types of cognitive/mental abilities seem to be affected while others aren't?
Also, consider Broca's aphasia and Wernicke's aphasia. Why is it that when one part of the brain is damaged, only one or two types of cognitive/mental abilities seem to be affected while others aren't?
See my comment about basic statistics above.
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
MCalavera wrote:
As someone with Asperger's, would you say (from personal experience) that social intelligence tends to correlate with the traditional construct of intelligence (academic, intellectual, whatever)?
Anecdote. People on the Autism spectrum make up 1-2 percent of the human population.
Is this anecdote?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/10336657
Link to full study:
http://docs.autismresearchcentre.com/pa ... l_FMRI.pdf
Seems like there is a worthy distinction to be made between social intelligence and what is termed general intelligence. This also confirms what many people with autism actually have to struggle with despite often high general intelligence.
See my comment about basic statistics above.
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
Psychopaths, who are estimated to make up 1 percent of the human population, generally demonstrate superior social intelligence, but I don't use them as a model for human cognition either.
Are you saying that we shouldn't look into why the discrepancies since they're just "outliers"?
I would expect the existence of psychopaths, savants, and autistic people to actually provide fuel for more personal inquiry into what exactly really goes on within the human brain when it comes to intelligence. They are all still human beings at the end of the day and, therefore, share many common brain regions and neural pathways.
See my comment about basic statistics above.
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
MCalavera wrote:
But if, say, you don't consider social intelligence a type of intelligence, but rather something else, then what would be the justification for it?
See my previous reply. Social intelligence is intelligence, but it is just a subcomponent of g.
In mathematics, being good at differentiation is theoretically distinct from being good at integration, but if you have high mathematical ability, you are likely to be good at both.
In intelligence, being good as socializing is theoretically distinct from being good at mathematics, but if you have high intelligence, you are likely to be good at both.
No contest with that. I totally agree. The question isn't about whether the correlations are significantly high, but whether there is enough justification to keep them all under one category given the observed discrepancies in adeptness levels for multiple intelligences among many people.
There is not an observed discrepancy. This is something you have made up. And once again, your concept of "many people" seems to be completely arbitrary.
MCalavera wrote:
GGPViper wrote:
Because Gardners theory of multiple intelligences has been systematically derided in the scientific literature for lacking empirical validity, as per my previous links.
Derided sounds like an exaggeration. Many experts and academics in psychology agree with the plausibility of multiple intelligences. Even if they aren't exactly as categorized by Gardner himself, there is strong evidence that multiple intelligences are real, and the irony is that even proponents of one intelligence theory would easily agree should they discard the arguments of semantics and focus on what exactly is being argued.
There is *not* strong evidence that multiple intelligences are real. There is strong evidence that they are *not*. See the links in my first reply (including the very first link, a Nature article co-authored by Ian Deary, the perhaps most eminent current researcher in the field of intelligence).
If the evidence is so strong, then why don't you post it? Peer-review only, please...
The only study I could find is *this*, which - despite its boasting conclusions - was based on a (1) non-representative internet sample and (2) neurological conclusions from a sample of only 16 individuals. This is way below the recommendations of the Central Limit Theorem (at least 30). And for comparison, my previous link regarding Emotional/General intelligence had a sample size of 152).
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/ar ... 7312005843
And please try sticking to generally accepted scientific standards instead of cherry-picking non-representative studies. Thank you.
01 Dec 2013, 3:29 pm
GGPViper wrote:
They are not "unquestionably being lumped" into one single category. Psychometric g has been studied and refined through thousands of scientific studies for 88 years since the concept was introduced in 1925. It is because these studies validate the concept of general intelligence that the concept is used, not because they lack the capacity for critical inquiry of MCalavera.
That's misleading. You are trying to lump all sorts of intelligences into this one intelligence, including those that aren't related to academics. History of research into this area hasn't been supporting such a general broad claim.
Quote:
Anecdotes, anecdotes, anecdotes. All of these groups make up very small portions of the human population. It would be scientifically fraudulent to base one's opinion about IQ on the study of these groups. This is rudimentary statistics.
Unconditionally ignoring select data is not very scientific, GGViper. Especially if they matter quite a lot when it comes to debates like this.
Even in statistics, you still have to make some judgements whether the more extreme data are relevant or not.
http://courses.ttu.edu/isqs5349-westfal ... _to_do.htm
Quote:
What are you trying to show me exactly here? I assure you I know what factor analysis means. Thank you very much.
Quote:
And your concept of "some people" seems to be entirely arbitrary. There is a reason why scientists use statistical tests, you know?
All you're doing is hiding behind the mask of an extremely rigid use of science (that I don't know any social scientist actually applies) without even looking at the context and figuring out if this or that are needed.
Statistics isn't so rigid as you make it out to be.
As for these "some people", they are very real. People exhibit all sorts of different levels for different intelligences. I gave you examples myself. That is reasonable evidence that multiple intelligences exist (which even psychologists themselves admit they are). Whether science has put this to the test or not is a different matter, but it is still evidence.
Also, multiple intelligences theory does a better job at explaining the outliers and has yet to be falsified.
Quote:
See my comment about basic statistics above.
How scientific of you to brush aside these questions. But if you want to not think about them, that's your problem.
However, I find it interesting you actually ignored the link that showed that social intelligence is distinct from general intelligence.
Quote:
There is not an observed discrepancy. This is something you have made up. And once again, your concept of "many people" seems to be completely arbitrary.
Nope, nothing is being made up. You just don't want to look.
Quote:
There is *not* strong evidence that multiple intelligences are real. There is strong evidence that they are *not*. See the links in my first reply (including the very first link, a Nature article co-authored by Ian Deary, the perhaps most eminent current researcher in the field of intelligence).
Nope, you just made that up. But nice try.
Quote:
If the evidence is so strong, then why don't you post it? Peer-review only, please...
How disingenuous. Savants not good enough for you? And I posted one anyway, so why ignore it and then demand I post another?
Quote:
The only study I could find is *this*, which - despite its boasting conclusions - was based on a (1) non-representative internet sample and (2) neurological conclusions from a sample of only 16 individuals. This is way below the recommendations of the Central Limit Theorem (at least 30).
But why not be satisfied with what I posted. It's peer-review as well. I assure you.
Quote:
And please try sticking to generally accepted scientific standards instead of cherry-picking non-representative studies. Thank you.
In other words, you're telling me not to post peer-review studies that contradict your argument if they refer to certain groups of people. That's not going to happen. They are just as important and relevant.
01 Dec 2013, 4:09 pm
Oh, and about factor analysis (from Wikipedia):
"...each orientation is equally acceptable mathematically. But different factorial theories proved to differ as much in terms of the orientations of factorial axes for a given solution as in terms of anything else, so that model fitting did not prove to be useful in distinguishing among theories." (Sternberg, 1977[8]). This means all rotations represent different underlying processes, but all rotations are equally valid outcomes of standard factor analysis optimization. Therefore, it is impossible to pick the proper rotation using factor analysis alone.
Factor analysis can be only as good as the data allows. In psychology, where researchers often have to rely on less valid and reliable measures such as self-reports, this can be problematic.
Interpreting factor analysis is based on using a "heuristic", which is a solution that is "convenient even if not absolutely true".[9] More than one interpretation can be made of the same data factored the same way, and factor analysis cannot identify causality.
01 Dec 2013, 4:31 pm
MCalavera wrote:
Oh, and about factor analysis (from Wikipedia):
"...each orientation is equally acceptable mathematically. But different factorial theories proved to differ as much in terms of the orientations of factorial axes for a given solution as in terms of anything else, so that model fitting did not prove to be useful in distinguishing among theories." (Sternberg, 1977[8]). This means all rotations represent different underlying processes, but all rotations are equally valid outcomes of standard factor analysis optimization. Therefore, it is impossible to pick the proper rotation using factor analysis alone.
Factor analysis can be only as good as the data allows. In psychology, where researchers often have to rely on less valid and reliable measures such as self-reports, this can be problematic.
Interpreting factor analysis is based on using a "heuristic", which is a solution that is "convenient even if not absolutely true".[9] More than one interpretation can be made of the same data factored the same way, and factor analysis cannot identify causality.
"...each orientation is equally acceptable mathematically. But different factorial theories proved to differ as much in terms of the orientations of factorial axes for a given solution as in terms of anything else, so that model fitting did not prove to be useful in distinguishing among theories." (Sternberg, 1977[8]). This means all rotations represent different underlying processes, but all rotations are equally valid outcomes of standard factor analysis optimization. Therefore, it is impossible to pick the proper rotation using factor analysis alone.
Factor analysis can be only as good as the data allows. In psychology, where researchers often have to rely on less valid and reliable measures such as self-reports, this can be problematic.
Interpreting factor analysis is based on using a "heuristic", which is a solution that is "convenient even if not absolutely true".[9] More than one interpretation can be made of the same data factored the same way, and factor analysis cannot identify causality.
_________________
"If we fail to anticipate the unforeseen or expect the unexpected in a universe of infinite possibilities, we may find ourselves at the mercy of anyone or anything that cannot be programmed, categorized or easily referenced."
-XFG (no longer a moderator)
01 Dec 2013, 4:50 pm
Yeah, it's not as conclusive as GGViper made it out to be.
Consider the following hypothetical study:
It was hypothesized that people who excel in one sport were more likely to excel in other sports. A sample of (insert number greater than 30) was examined and asked to participate in both soccer and basketball. Results showed that there was a significantly positive correlation between skillfulness in soccer and skillfulness in basketball.
Now what do we make of this? Does this mean that, even though, there were people who only excelled in one of the sports, that it's still clear there is really only one type of "sports skillfulness" and that it is to be divided into subcategories of "soccer skillfulness" and "basketball skillfulness"?
What do we make of those who only excelled in one of the sports? Does it really make more sense not to think in terms of "multiple skillfulnesses" just because of the high correlation? How do we know the correlation is really just that - a correlation? And that it could be that those who are not too short and not too slow will tend to excel at both sports but that for those who are too short or too slow have to figure out other ways to excel?
Short people in basketball could make up for lack of height by being good three-pointers, have great jumping skills, or maybe have very long arms. One does not necessarily need to be so tall in order to excel, although being tall may be a big advantage.
01 Dec 2013, 5:25 pm
fibonaccispiral777 wrote:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25135225
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
In short you make no real distinction between the better and the worse, the greater and the smaller. What you make instead are excuses and explanations. Nice going.
ruveyn
01 Dec 2013, 5:31 pm
ruveyn wrote:
fibonaccispiral777 wrote:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-25135225
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
What do you think about his comments?
I personally do not find it that immoral to say that some of humanity are clever than others. If someone has spent years researching and writing a book, they are in my opinion far cleverer than somebody who sits on their sofa all day watching Jeremy Kyle. That sounds like an awful thing to say and many things may be preventing the latter person from attaining their true level of intelligence but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say. Saying this however, I do not believe IQ should be the only way of testing a child's intelligence and children who are creative and musical and so forth should also be considered of worth to our society. However, I am NOT saying that this means those who suffer from disabilities and so forth should not be given any economical attention since I believe while we may be not equal in intelligence, everyone is equal in regards to the most basic human rights such as water, food and shelter and so forth and it should be our duty as well as the governments duty to make sure such minorities can live in acceptable conditions and not exploit the notion of elitism to justify dismantling the social welfare state. In no way, should his comments on IQ justify any form of fraudulent economic culture that makes the poor poorer and the rich richer and pretend that this is because the rich are somehow more clever. I hope I am not being too confusing and sound completely right wing. I can assure you I am not. Anyway, sorry for the stupid post.
In short you make no real distinction between the better and the worse, the greater and the smaller. What you make instead are excuses and explanations. Nice going.
ruveyn
What the hell does that mean? Could you be clearer instead of just being sarcastic. Sorry my opinion does not satisfy you.
01 Dec 2013, 7:20 pm
fibonaccispiral777 wrote:
[
What the hell does that mean? Could you be clearer instead of just being sarcastic. Sorry my opinion does not satisfy you.
What the hell does that mean? Could you be clearer instead of just being sarcastic. Sorry my opinion does not satisfy you.
Look at your won words:
but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say.
Do you mean them literally?
ruveyn
01 Dec 2013, 9:52 pm
He is saying that there are those who are simply academically/intellectually more intelligent than others, and that it shouldn't be wrong to point this out, something which I agree with myself. I just don't agree that, therefore, there aren't other types of intelligences to consider.
02 Dec 2013, 7:23 am
ruveyn wrote:
fibonaccispiral777 wrote:
[
What the hell does that mean? Could you be clearer instead of just being sarcastic. Sorry my opinion does not satisfy you.
What the hell does that mean? Could you be clearer instead of just being sarcastic. Sorry my opinion does not satisfy you.
Look at your won words:
but I do feel our obsession with moral relativism has reached the point in which even saying that people are unequal in terms of intelligence some ghastly thing to say.
Do you mean them literally?
ruveyn
How could I mean them metaphorically?
02 Dec 2013, 7:25 am
MCalavera wrote:
He is saying that there are those who are simply academically/intellectually more intelligent than others, and that it shouldn't be wrong to point this out, something which I agree with myself. I just don't agree that, therefore, there aren't other types of intelligences to consider.
Exactly, I will perfectly admit that intelligence is a multidimensional object and it includes many other things such as social intelligence and artistic intelligence and so forth but I still stand by my point that people are naturally more academically more intelligent than one another, however this as an attitude seems rather taboo nowadays. Its seems Boris Johnson was using to justify a lack of social mobility, which is I don't think is a good thing.
