The IQ debate, a conclusion

[@avrahamavraham5977]

Habibi, where have you been long time no see

[@TheSnowLeopard]

It'd be funny if you compared IQ tests to the use of finger-digit ratios in studies - given the latter has also been used as a biomarker for almost everything.

[@GarenGregorian]

Since linear regression maximizes the models explanatory power for the sample, would it be correct to think about the value of how much of the variance is NOT explained by the model as the lower limit? In other words, for this sample e.g above IQ 120, AT MOST ~0.5% of the variance is explained by a linear regression model

[@nntalebproba]

Excellent!

[@philk.6034]

In that moment, are you not taking the output of the linear model to evaluate the accuracy of the same model? Isn't that a biased view? It might be a rough estimate, but coud just as well be 5% or 0.05%, no?

[@mistaacrowley]

I’ve learned a lot, and will no longer be spewing so much nonsense about the utility of such a measure

[@ZonnaLoves]

❤❤❤so happy to see you again 🥰😘

[@sefetv]

Thank you for fighting the good fight, mr Taleb ! I will never understand the sheer arrogance and ignorance of these people who seem to think that if you were able to spot some arbitrary patterns on an IQ test and that if were able to generate mindless permutations of a set like a computer would, then you are obviously able to spot every other pattern in the world much faster than a person who scored lower than you on an IQ test. What worries me is that a lot of these people are psychologists and cognitive scientists and that a lot of these people seem to be gaining more and more authority in society on the matter of intelligence. For instance, in my home country, psychologists can unilaterally decide if you are fit enough both cognitive wise and personality wise in order to become a judge. It does not matter how well you do exams which involve solving concrete problems of law : if you fail to do well on one of their mindnumbing ”cogntiive tests”, then they will fail you.

[@illx2098]

psychologists are mind colonialists using humanist language.

[@Gilamang]

Very persuasive. People in social sciences are constantly getting super excited about statistically significant effects that have no practical effect. Most substantial impact here seems to relate to educational attainment, which is interesting but not really an end in itself.

[@maimonida]

This man is a monument in every sense of the word!!! I deeply admire his courage, his ethics, his philosophy of life, his intelligence, and his personality. He is the kind of MAN we wish there were more of!

[@kubricksghost6058]

My girlfriend is non rational but wins all the arguments, what is her IQ?

[@lorenzom7237]

what is yours? arguing with your gf..

[@kubricksghost6058]

@@lorenzom7237 I imagined it was 100 because its a nice round number

[@matthiaskohler8221]

100+. She wins all arguments against any men, but there may be women more intelligent than your girlfriend. But you will not be capable to grasp the nature of her IQ nor be able to compare between women's IQ btw: the IQ was invented by men. I think it is as useless as measuring properties of god with logical proofs...

[@sneeuwballa]

whatever yours is +1

[@DrGonzaloSaiz]

Great to see you again Prof Taleb. I Appreciate your videos. ¡Mil gracias!

[@Tkkgdfk1234]

Hey NNT, thanks for your books and these videos. They’ve been really helpful to develope my thinking and shape my thoughts 🙏

[@ReadingIDEAS.-uz9xk]

I have done a lot of research on this in UK and no one is interested. No one! 57% pass GCSE's 43% don't - fixed. They are deciding who can be a nurse by writing essays on Romeo and Juliet! A nurse earns £36,000 a year, a care assistant £16,000. No political party looks after the unqualified people. You want an increase in the minimum wage - fine. You want to be a nurse sorry no! Care assistants wage goes up to £16,500 and nurses demand a pro rata wage increase to £38,000! The pass mark for an exam is decided after the exam is taken not before to ensure 57/43. Maybe it is 106 out of 240 a pass and 105 a fail. But there is human error in marking giving a 17.8% error rate of an entire grade! A grade!.

[@Dr.advocatejha]

I am grateful for your books. Thank you for your time and insights 🙏🏻

[@bonzesaunders]

The idea that psychologists can measure "Occupational Attainment" is ludicrous in the extreme! - Annette

[@foljs5858]

Things like salary and role is quite a huge proxy - they're not checking if one is a really good garbage collector and another is a mediocre banker

[@paddleed6176]

Yes because being a doctor versus working at McDonalds is certainly not a valid comparison, amiright

[@burnhamsghost8044]

@@foljs5858salary is a very poor metric

[@schermnaam5811]

Thanks Nassim for sharing these data. I was randomly fortunate that my college statistics course/lab was superbly taught (by a mathematical psychologist no less, who otherwise studied decision theory) and later was asked to run pre-PC statistics software (BMDP, SAS, SPSS, via VAX/VMS) on essentially non-linearly distributed data, thus always aware of how flimsy to inappropriate many (if not most) social, economic, and some medical research “conclusions” were/continue to be. JBP may not be as driven by political ideology as Murray, et al., but his arrogant misunderstanding of statistics and probability has revived a previously discredited IQ “narrative.” So grateful for your dogged debunking!

[@lc2190]

Grazie Professore e bonni auguri per l’anno nuovo.

[@Senecamarcus]

Good to see you sir!

[@twistedbydsign99]

Nassim did I understand correctly you are saying it correlates with many other variables but it does not explain those variables?

[@Rudzani]

Good to see you pop back in on KZbin!

[@tapio_m6861]

The problem with intelligence in general is that there is no one clear definition of what intelligence is. Arguably there can be many types of intelligence. - Being able to think on your feet can be considered intelligence. - Being able to take in loads of information in short timespan can be considered intelligence. - Being able to notice patterns can be considered intelligence. - Being able to do mental arithmetic well can be considered intelligence. - Being able to farm wheat well and efficiently can be considered intelligence. Point being, what is intelligence? Is it the ability to apply knowledge into real life situations? Maybe... and I think that might be the best definition we can have, if we need to have a single definition, but in that case the standard IQ tests absolutely does not measure it.

[@OneLine122]

It's pattern recognition in theory. Ability to understand words and infer the essence of things. In order you put them, I would say those things are: Reason, Memory, Intelligence, Reason, Skill, Practical Wisdom Reason, Skill and Practical Wisdom are quite intertwined but aren't intelligence proper.

[@user-xn2wg2oe7s]

I think the majority of disagreements on this discussion are due to different/subjective definitions of intelligence.

[@tinalexmauch2780]

Actually not. It is about psychologists wild claims based on poor data.

[@user-xn2wg2oe7s]

@@tinalexmauch2780 I was referring to the topic as a whole, but yeah I see how this video is technically about the misuse of questionable research.

[@jasonkassa2204]

How much does weight 'nepotism' with earning, and occupation?

[@johanngizurarson7235]

Thomas Sowell also points to the fact that African Americans between states also vary markedly. I also found this to be highly unlikely that they are less smarter…just look how a Demographic with 14% of the total population just rule the cultural scence (with regards to influence)

[@hearstory7169]

What does he mean by "no negative performance"? And is he saying I need an entire village for the 1-3 percent effectiveness of IQ?

[@offensivearch]

No negative performance -> having a high measured IQ does not diminish performance (no negative correlation). Entire village -> you need very large samples to detect any positive correlation between IQ and performance.

[@hearstory7169]

@@offensivearch Reliable performance, error-free, significant, isn't that meaningful?

[@LindaMmaghw]

Haloo👋NNT, I read your books.

[@zadeh79]

If you design a test written in chinese, with some math problems, than it is effectively a test of chinese - not one's ability to do math. Similarly, an IQ test taps very elementary learning ability, before it measures their 'intelligence'. With higher IQ, where individuals are no longer is burdened by elementary learning and the nuisances of sentence-to-sentence interpretation, then they can demonstrate actual (developmental) ability, which is closer to real intelligence. Basically, an IQ test taps mostly the ability to interpret the problem, not an ability to create an answer - the latter is where the real intelligence is.

[@batsoup7031]

The number of people in science, often in psychology, talking about correlation of 0.1 in the broad scientific literature is really shocking. I'd say the Pearson measure of correlation means nothing at all unless it is above at least 0.8, but that's controversial.

[@jamesmarsh4047]

good stuff nassim

[@inquiry6274]

Great video!

[@lICharlIR]

Imagine such a ridiculously simple misinformed synopsis for a basic non-robust t-test result in one of the most famous econometrics papers. Money won't be lost over it, just maybe some sleep. Reader can guess it's just a wink from the authors. Whereas on the more anthropocentric side of social science this misinformation stacks so quickly and propagates so widely, one can only hope it's not by design. One thing I can't estimate is how many polemics it would take to fix it. It just doesn't scale without AI. Thank you. Happy New Year.

[@behrad9712]

Great to see you and your unique ideas👌🙏 from Iran

[@maimonida]

Si j'ai bien compris, un modèle linéaire n’est pas adapté pour expliquer les données des personnes avec un QI > 120, car il laisse presque toute la variation des résultats (99,5 %) sans explication. Une autre approche serait nécessaire pour mieux comprendre ces données.

[@DaggerSecurity]

IQ alone is not enough to explain why some people are high earners. The degree of motivation and personality should also be considered. Conversely, being a high earner does not indicate a high IQ.

[@ChiefsFanInSC]

Emotional Intelligence is linked to higher earnings, not IQ. IQ is VERY important regarding educational attainment. For example, I am willing to wager that the vast majority of graduates of tier 1 medical universities have IQs north of 120.

[@sonicmaths8285]

the big five model helps in that regard

[@PicaPauDiablo1]

Taleb has been fighting this battle with their "best" and they cant land a glove on him. Its pretty funny watching them just get crushed. The Ill Beat you with your own data is the best.

[@sof553]

"IQ" tests should be based on the Raven's Progressive Matrices as it is a universal test that measures pattern recognition. Pattern recognition and speed is what we are really looking at.

[@sonicmaths8285]

hmmm, not sure. I mean I understand why you think that way but might this be a unidimensional pov on that matter, maybe even unnecessarily reductionistic. I see such patterns of thinking all the time. arguments like that go like this: the mechanics of the world can be explained through physics and physics is (basically) nothing other than applied math. applied math is nothing other than pure maths applied. pure maths is nothing other than philosophy applied and applied philosophy is nothing else than applied linguistics, etc. you should see how reductionistic and actually wrong this argumentation is. the problem with such arguments is that ppl simplify things waaaay too much. most things are much more convoluted than that and cannot be broken down. it's certainly not easy to get out of such a loop of thinking since it's recursive but it will eventually lead you nowhere (besides being inaccurate). from a very specified, constructed pov this might be true, but it's not enough to explain everything. you discard the whole spectrum of abilities. e.g. a highly intelligent, arguably even brilliant friend of mine is incredibly gifted mathematically. however, his linguistic skills are very questionable since he makes very stupid orthographical mistakes, takes more time than usual to read stuff, doesn't have an appropriate vocab for his level of intellect (and age), isn't good at articulating himself well, takes more time than usual to learn languages, etc. you wouldn't capture this relative disability if you'd just test for visual pattern recognition and speed of thought and so on. you'd also may wouldn't notice his "exact" level of giftedness in math as well, etc. besides, according to spearman's hypothesis, cognitive abilities only become more nuanced with greater intelligence so even slight differences in strata 2-3 abilities (referring to carroll's model and et al.) IQ points make huge differences for the cognitive profile of an individual overall. as long as IQ hasn't been sufficiently understood, we shouldn't speculate abt such stuff (espec. with such lack of scientific rigor). I hardly think you're a researcher and qualified psychologist to make such claims. keep in mind: I'm not attacking you. as far as I've noticed such behavior usually displays a dunning-kruger effect at play

[@SS-kg8rj]

Can always count on you to give a new perspective.

[@ThiagoVieira91]

> no swearing Is this AI Nassim Taleb? 🤔

[@jasonkassa2204]

The job market...🎉😊

[@Canadian_Eh_I]

Thanks Nassim, very interesting. And as far as I know, IQ is heralded as the best metric we haveto measure intelligence!

[@philk.6034]

the IQ test measures intelligence just as good as a test of mental arithmetic measures your mathematical abilities, i.e. very low correlation. I guess the scope of the IQ test is just too broad, "intelligence" can be broken down into many subcategories, e.g. scientific, social, musical, lingual etc. and you can make test for these fields, but even then it will be hard to judge, because there are sub-fields and so on, so the whole business is just a waste of resources and stroking some people's ego. Let actions and achievements speak for a person, not some arbitrary metric.

[@bitdropout]

People are different. Some have great athletic ability. That can be easily measured at puberty. Similarly for intelligence. That doesn't mean that a high IQ individual is more worthy than those with lower IQ. It does mean that the high IQ individual will do well in occupations requiring a high IQ.

[@Alex-ik6pu]

0:01 3:15

[@muradtalukdar4401]

I have an interesting problem for you to ponder especially in this fine series. A paper by John O'Quigley at UCL's Department of Statistics: "Suspected serial killers and unsuspected statistical blunders" Especially concerning the correlation as causation for deaths of patients in certain hospitals being attributed to nurses via shift patterns.

[@andreylogunov2944]

Thank you!

[@jarinorvanto4301]

I recall a study by Simonton et al in the mid 1980ies, stating that in workplaces, there was a positive correlation between the IQ of the leader and the 'perceived leadership' amongst the employees, up to +1.2 SD above the group's mean IQ. Higher IQ than that seemed to punish the 'perceived leadership'. Note that this didn't regard the leader's actual operational success. As a sidenote, one might add Schopenhauer's advice to intellectually capable men to dumb down in social settings. But he was probably a recluse, so perhaps he was more hypothetical than practical in his advice.

[@sonicmaths8285]

hm, generally I agree. still, I think schopenhauer was on to smth. it becomes particularly apparent when you talk to average ppl or ppl that are much less intelligent than you are

[@prashantpareek5863]

Hi,can somebody please tell me the summary of this video, I did not understand it completely.

[@rishitutu6778]

👌👌

[@anon2034]

Notice NNN's hard preference - he lives in an average and above average IQ place/(nation) state. Strangly enough he doesn't "live dangerously" in a place like Somalia or Congo. General cognitive ability of the population is of importance in any endeavor. Including having basics like clean water and electicity. See how Rhodesia and South Africa are doing. Technical details are irrelevant. Your hard preference is the only thing that speaks.

[@ChrisShupe]

I don't think he disagrees. He's saying above a basic level of competence (i.e. IQ of 100-120), additional IQ doesn't do much for you.

[@sonicmaths8285]

@@ChrisShupe I hardly think it doesn't help you. ofc anything that becomes "abundant" leads to disadvantages as well (or increases the likelihood and degree of it). however, the higher your level of intelligence, the easier, faster and more precise your reasoning and understanding will get. e.g. a mathematician will have a much easier time solving a hard equation, or problem, doing research, etc. the more intelligent he is because it will take less time to understand things (thoroughly) and assist in formulating or thinking abt correct theories, ideas, impact, etc.

[@ChiefsFanInSC]

I am curious, what is the percent of medical doctors and Phds in math, physics, chemistry, that have an IQ below 110?

[@naasking]

In the West, zero.

[@alfredthepatientxcvi]

Greetings from Beirut, Phoenicia ;)

[@Nonplused]

I am not sure why Taleb is on and on about IQ, resorting to selecting one biased and probably useless study as compared to other biased and probably useless studies. Is he contending that there is no such thing as intelligence? Or that it does not vary from person to person, like every other physical attribute? Or is it just the current slate of tests that he does not think are valid? Or perhaps he thinks it's like physical fitness, and can be largely improved with exercise and diet? I mean I suppose there is no reason to think that it can't be subject to environmental factors, but just dissing the concept as false isn't adding to the conversation. Clearly some people are as dumb as a bag of hammers, and others are quite brilliant within their fields. And it does seem to be that there are certain people who can't manage even the most basic improvements. There are some people who just aren't going to pass a calculus course no matter what you do or how much support you offer them, short of destroying the curriculum. There are levels of thought that are clearly beyond some people, although I suppose how much is environmental is up for debate. But what can you do to change the environmental factors after a certain point? It may be like language, in which there is only a certain window for full acquisition (of the first language, second+ languages seem to depend on the acquisition of the first...)

[@RJ-se9op]

>t. increasingly nervous high IQ coper

[@offensivearch]

"Is he contending that there is no such thing as intelligence?" He clearly answered that question and some of your other questions at the start of the video. Please watch the video carefully before asking stupid questions.

[@samuellblake]

debate Richard Haier or Lee Jussim or stephen hsu or james lee kzbin.info/www/bejne/fpDcXoCcfK58etk james lee is an expert

[@mhmhmhmhmhmhmmhmh]

Small effect sizes (e.g., R^2 = 0.01 to 0.10) are common but can still have practical significance. For example: A small increase in educational attainment or income can have a meaningful impact on an individual’s quality of life. At the population level, even small effects can lead to significant differences in outcomes (e.g., higher average income or lower rates of unemployment). Therefore, the small R^2 values reflect the multifactorial nature of life outcomes and IQ still matters! [Do you think this argument is just another attempt to defend the relevance of IQ research, driven by reluctance to admit I’ve spent over 20 years producing research waste? Well, maybe.]

[@armoda1057]

So it virtually doesn’t predict income. Not sure what to make of the occupational attainment correlation because that’s a murky thing to measure. The educational attainment correlation below 120 is decently sized (for social sciences). Would’ve been nice to see what it is for the whole range. But like you said, it’s a bit circular because IQ tests are somewhat similar to standardized exams.

[@mrv4684]

Wow, youre still with us lol, anyway thank you for sharing your intelligent view point.

[@tungcaveusd]

Love Nassim...

[@JohnVKaravitis]

What language is this?

[@synaspora]

It would have been helpful if he had provided more context--for example, how does intelligence (as measured by IQ) compare as an explanatory factor when compared with other factors such as SES, conscientiousness, motivation/grit, emotional stability, etc.?

[@asdf8asdf8asdf8asdf]

Black swans have changed to straw men.

[@Minder777]

Sounds inconclusive.

[@Calidastas]

Debate Murray.

[@augurcybernaut4785]

Uuuuuh I have $6 that says your bestie Russ Roberts would strongly disagree

[@2894031]

Unclear what really is „closed“, but if the whole idea was to subtract r^2 from 1, then it must be something really deep that everyone in science missed for decades 🙄

[@εγεω]

Thank you!