"Malcolm"  wrote:-

> > JE:-
> > I agree IQ has been misused. However, those
> > that misuse it will never admit such. The
> > establishment just blunders on, irrespective.

> M:-
> Accusations of "misuse" of IQ tests are frequently flung about.

JE:-
Do you agree that IQ has been misused?

> > JE:-
> > My main point is: scientific theory must be
> > tested against nature and not just dictate it.

> M:-
> This is very important. Some science is just descriptive, but to get
> anywhere really interesting you must make predictions.

JE:-
Yes, and not just retrospective
predictions. Also, valid points of
refutation must be provided. Psychologists
seem to be blissfully ignorant of this
basic Popperian requirement.

> > JE:-
> > This means that IQ MUST, at the very LEAST,
> > correlate with a proven RANGE of KNOWN
> > abilities to even BEGIN to be a recognised
> > test for "intelligence. This has never been
> > the case. No evidence exists that IQ can
> > be correlated with a range of proven excellence.

> M:-
> IQ does correlate with many things (notoriously, race). It also correlates
> well with teachers' subjective impressions of which children are
> "intelligent". Performace on the same tests has also improved over the
> years, the Flynn effect. So the tests are measuring something,
> the question
> is, exactly what.

JE:-
Psychologists seem to be in danger or creating
a sub set of reality to fit their theory of
intelligence rather than unbiased measuring
their theory against nature. Such an event
misrepresents science to ordinary people
as just another tyranny.

> > JE:-
> > Within any trading society, a DIVERSITY of
> > intelligence types is more important than
> > lumps of the same type. However, the ivory
> > tower academics think that only their view
> > of the world reflects "intelligence" and misuses
> > tests that reflect how _they_ think.

> M:-
> Of course. Academic work rightly has a high status. However academics are
> not the best paid people on the planet - other skills are more useful to
> wealth generating companies. So we shouldn't be trying to force
> children who
> have no aptitude for academic work into an academic mould.

JE:-
IMHO IQ misuse results in  exactly this.
My experience of high IQ academics is that
they mostly, have no "common sense". Business
requires quite a different mentality, i.e.
an intelligence based on extreme "common
sense". I find it amusing that mostly, the
academic and business worlds mix like
oil and water.

> M:-
> What IQ tests mainly measure, in my opinion, is attitude to
> education.

JE:-
I agree. However "education"
is today, almost a public
sector monopoly. Thus we
may be in danger of allowing
clones of public sector thinking
(which tends to be an antithesis
of business community thinking)
to determine who is high and low
in intelligence within a free
society. Such an event would be
catastrophic.

I find it amazing that Neo Darwinism
seems to have almost no concept of
the overriding importance of trade as
a unique human adaptation. Instead,
most of their efforts remain focused
on organism fitness altruism within
nature. It is obvious that "altruism"
and "selfishness" are only politically
loaded terms that should be avoided
within the sciences at all costs.
Instead they have been embraced
with enthusiasm.

The business
community thinks mostly on a
"selfish" basis but the public
sector is mostly dominated by
"altruistic" thinking. This is
because both perceive themselves
as making their living from
their own thinking bias, i.e.
it appears to me that _both_ are
self serving. My interest is
in the evolution of mutualism.
IMHO all stable associations are
mutualistic. I disregard all
selfish and altruistic arguments
as just hopelessly politically biased
arguments.

> M:-
> This
> would account for the Flynn effect, because now good school
> reports are much
> more a passport to university and jobs than they were previously.

JE:-
Can you imagine the human catastrophe
within a trading society that allowed
academics to reserve "good school reports"
for just intelligence clones of themselves?

Regards,

John Edser
Independent Researcher

PO Box 266
Church Pt
NSW 2105
Australia

edser{at}tpg.com.au
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