DNA tests can predict intelligence

GreatApe

Moby wrote: »

Gathering people in a room to test their intelligence is not the correct environment to test emotional intelligence. When I was at University I knew many people who were assessed as intelligent by IQ tests, members of MENSA etc but many of these same people came up short on skills such as communication, empathy, understanding other peoples body language etc. It is patently obvious that a person who has lived all his life as a bushman in the Kalahari would not be able to process information in the same way as a westerner or Asian person.....people have deduced from this that the bushman is therefore less intelligent but of course we are now aware that the cultural difference is so huge this makes an accurate assessment unhelpful or highly contentious. In Universities there have been huge controversies when 'research' has attempted to link intelligence and race but it is now generally accepted that different societies value and promote different kinds of skills and that the concept of intelligence is therefore culturally variable and cannot be measured by the same criteria in different societies. Of course as we can see on this thread many people have their own political axe to grind and use IQ tests as cover to hide their own malign prejudices.

The Human mind is a very complicated pattern recognition machine
Different parts of the brain do different things
This means you can have people like me who are great at some things like math invention logic memory but really terrible at other things like countdown. Either a part of my brain is damaged or the pattern recognition software for words is much less efficient than the average person.

IQ tests try to figure out how good your pattern recognition machine is in a limited time frame with limited resources. So it isn't perfect but it is very good at predicting general intelligence. Get a High score and it will predict quite well your general intelligence.

Malthusian

Moby wrote: »

Gathering people in a room to test their intelligence is not the correct environment to test emotional intelligence.

It is impossible to test emotional intelligence, which is part of how you know it doesn't exist.

When I was at University I knew many people who were assessed as intelligent by IQ tests, members of MENSA etc but many of these same people came up short on skills such as communication, empathy, understanding other peoples body language etc.

These are useful skills but are not intelligence. There is no objective test of being nice. Whether someone is perceived as being nice depends as much on the observer as on the subject's actions. You can be nice to someone and be perceived as patronising by the observer because they're in a bad mood, or be abusive and be perceived as lovely because they're vulnerable.

By contrast, 2 + 2 never adds up to 5 because 2 is in a bad mood. Which makes it possible to measure whether someone can consistently add up 2 + 2 and get the correct answer, which we call intelligence.

It is patently obvious that a person who has lived all his life as a bushman in the Kalahari would not be able to process information in the same way as a westerner or Asian person.....

Ancient lefty racism straight out of a Max Mosley pamphlet. "Bushman in the Kalahari can't process information in the same way as the white man" indeed. The poor benighted souls.

System

Malthusian wrote: »

The ability to process information and derive a correct solution to a problem.

The ability to realise that the "correct solution" to a problem is the one that the identifier of the problem wishes to be the solution.

LHW99

When I was given a week's training course in test frequently used to provide an IQ score, the lecturer covered a number of basic points.
Assigning an IQ score could be done via the conventional reading / writing questions, or using other tests where the questions were numerical, pictorial or others.
All tests were 'standardised' so that by definition the 'average' person would score around 100, and there would be an approximately Gaussian distribution given a large enough sample.
Papers with written answers would probably indicate how well someone would do at school, but were less indicative of general life skills (eg emotional intelligence, hand-eye coordination, 3-D visualisation).
Given a battery of tests, one person could score very differently on each type, and that score could be affected by how the tester presented the tasks.
IMO the liklihood is that genetics may affect a person's maximum potential, but (as with genes giving a higher propensity to cancer or heart problems), how your life unwinds particularly in the early years is probably going to be what actually determines adult 'intelligence'

kinger101

LHW99 wrote: »

IMO the liklihood is that genetics may affect a person's maximum potential, but (as with genes giving a higher propensity to cancer or heart problems), how your life unwinds particularly in the early years is probably going to be what actually determines adult 'intelligence'

We'll, there's little doubt that genetics plays a role, but environment explains more of the variation, and it's the only one we have a realistic chance of changing.

Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man - Aristotle


PS -

Did you do the Myers-Briggs on that course? I think I'd have to tell them they're just horoscopes for graduates. It's rather sad that many employers still use them.

michaels

LHW99 wrote: »

When I was given a week's training course in test frequently used to provide an IQ score, the lecturer covered a number of basic points.
Assigning an IQ score could be done via the conventional reading / writing questions, or using other tests where the questions were numerical, pictorial or others.
All tests were 'standardised' so that by definition the 'average' person would score around 100, and there would be an approximately Gaussian distribution given a large enough sample.
Papers with written answers would probably indicate how well someone would do at school, but were less indicative of general life skills (eg emotional intelligence, hand-eye coordination, 3-D visualisation).
Given a battery of tests, one person could score very differently on each type, and that score could be affected by how the tester presented the tasks.
IMO the liklihood is that genetics may affect a person's maximum potential, but (as with genes giving a higher propensity to cancer or heart problems), how your life unwinds particularly in the early years is probably going to be what actually determines adult 'intelligence'

Seems to me if you can 'train' to do better in an IQ test then it is not measuring underlying intelligence.

Moby

Malthusian wrote: »

It is impossible to test emotional intelligence, which is part of how you know it doesn't exist.

These are useful skills but are not intelligence. There is no objective test of being nice. Whether someone is perceived as being nice depends as much on the observer as on the subject's actions. You can be nice to someone and be perceived as patronising by the observer because they're in a bad mood, or be abusive and be perceived as lovely because they're vulnerable.

By contrast, 2 + 2 never adds up to 5 because 2 is in a bad mood. Which makes it possible to measure whether someone can consistently add up 2 + 2 and get the correct answer, which we call intelligence.

Ancient lefty racism straight out of a Max Mosley pamphlet. "Bushman in the Kalahari can't process information in the same way as the white man" indeed. The poor benighted souls.

All your doing is asserting your definition of intelligence and your 2+2 example is puerile because no IQ test can be as objectively pure as maths for obvious reasons. As for your last comment I have no idea what you mean.

Moby

GreatApe wrote: »

The Human mind is a very complicated pattern recognition machine
Different parts of the brain do different things
This means you can have people like me who are great at some things like math invention logic memory but really terrible at other things like countdown. Either a part of my brain is damaged or the pattern recognition software for words is much less efficient than the average person.

IQ tests try to figure out how good your pattern recognition machine is in a limited time frame with limited resources. So it isn't perfect but it is very good at predicting general intelligence. Get a High score and it will predict quite well your general intelligence.

If its culturally sensitive it can be of limited value in predicting general intelligence but how does this explain poetry, art, Shakespeare, the creative, emotional side of us etc.? From my experience those who end up making the decisions in most areas of life have a range of skills, including emotional intelligence, good communication etc. The geek with the high IQ is often the saddo wallhanging at the party while the not quite as sharp rugby type gets the girl and a nice little job working for a law firm in the city;)

GreatApe

Moby wrote: »

If its culturally sensitive it can be of limited value in predicting general intelligence but how does this explain poetry, art, Shakespeare, the creative, emotional side of us etc.? From my experience those who end up making the decisions in most areas of life have a range of skills, including emotional intelligence, good communication etc. The geek with the high IQ is often the saddo wallhanging at the party while the not quite as sharp rugby type gets the girl and a nice little job working for a law firm in the city;)

What does culturally sensitive mean?

What makes you think high IQ means being awkward? Or that high IQ means low creativity? That's just so stupid. You might as well have added in that high IQ people are ugly to finish off that nonsense post of yours.

I've met high and low IQ people who are awkward in fact many more low IQ people who are.
You need High IQ to be good at communication and speaking not least because you have to read a lot to be a great speaker. Likewise the most creative tasks need high IQ do you think painting some fruit is creative while designing a fighter jet isn't? Taking photographs is creative while the team that built that machine totally void of creativity?

And your experience doesn't seem to bare out in real life. It looks like IQ is the primarily determinant in a successful career and financials followed closely by conscientiousness.

System

Moby wrote: »

. As for your last comment I have no idea what you mean.

It's obvious to me. He is scorning the idea that because Bushmen haven't the background, coaching or familiarity with western civilisation to score in IQ tests therefore they are unintelligent.