[chewyshine]

As a funded research academic who's studied cognitive ability(ies) for 25+ years, there are too many wacky and mistaken statements in these comments. Intelligence (aka g or IQ) is one of the best researched constructs in social science. We know more about it than virtually any other concept in the people space. We know what it predicts, we know alot about group differences on the variable, and -- to the extent possible in any science -- we know that the group differences are real and not a result of systemic bias in the assessments. We know there's a strong genetic component and, of course, enriching experiences like education can increase it to some extent. We know it's relatively stable from 21 to 60 and, at the group level of analysis, it decreases as folks move from middle age to old age.

So, this is one of those areas I know way too much about and many of the comments seem wrong-headed. Makes me wonder how much faith I should put in comments on topics where I don't know as much.

[tubby12345]

>Makes me wonder how much faith I should put in comments on topics where I don't know as much.

Despite murmurings to the contrary hn is no different from any other social media site that doesn't curate content. The fact that the denizens are techies or whatever doesn't supervene that fundamental fact. So the answer here is you should trust comments on hn just as much as you trust comments on Facebook.

As another funded academic in an area that comes up very frequently here (deep learning), personally I use hn as a link aggregator for interesting content and pay very little attention to the discussion.

[sudosysgen]

I don't think we actually know anywhere near as much as that about it. We have no idea that there is no systemic bias - even progressive matrices tests can credibly have some bias, I found them a lot easier since I've learnt about XOR for example. This is not something that has been studied sufficiently and it's very difficult to know each way, it remains that IQ tests are a cultural artifact.

As far as a strong genetic component, there are very few studies that actually establish that and they all have considerable issues. The extent that we know is that IQ is relatively strongly heritable, not genetic.

You will find that many funded research academics that study cognitive abilities disagree with your assessments.

[clove]

This is exactly the type of commenter he's talking about. Contributing to Gell-Mann Amnesia.

[sudosysgen]

I'm repeating what people with PhDs in psychology and psychopedagogy with specialities in measuring knowledge, intelligence and ability, which are currently implicated in ongoing research in the field have told me, almost verbatim.

There are currently a lot of unknowns as far as IQ. We have yet to accurately measure the cultural impact of IQ tests, in fact, we have yet to come up with a solid methodology for that, as all IQ tests are cultural artifacts.

We have yet to properly measure the fetal and epigenetic components of IQ, with differing impacts found that are still not totally accounted from.

We have yet to manage to completely square away at the Flynn effect, which is an incredibly large effect on IQ that may be fully cultural according to some psychologists, or based on non-cultural environment, as far as I'm aware or have been told this is still not fully explained.

At the same time, changes in relative IQ scores between groups are difficult to account for if IQ is as heritable as it seems to be,

There are a LOT of unknowns in IQ. It is far from "as well as understood as science can". We don't even know all that we don't know.

This isn't the Gell-Mann effect in action. This is someone trying to pass off a controversial opinion in a field (perhaps not amongst people whose job is to work on the tests for obvious reasons) as the established truth, and in doing so ignoring a body of research, which is far from unusual especially in these fields. At the very least the fact that I've heard one thing from multiple subject matter experts and something else from them shows that there is significantly more doubt and uncertainty as claimed in the original message.

[clove]

I hold an MS in psych, specializing in intelligence (the study of), and the original message matches with what I know. What you're saying matches with what people with anti-science agendas hold (and with what people who've received low scores on IQ tests say). Go back to Reddit is my advice to you.

[sudosysgen]

That's a very poor ad hominem. I'll leave it at that.

[dhanna]

The problem is that you’re not smarter than me so why should I trust your test?

[kettleballroll]

> So, this is one of those areas I know way too much about and many of the comments seem wrong-headed. Makes me wonder how much faith I should put in comments on topics where I don't know as much.

Experiencing the Gell-Mann amnesia firsthand is always weird. In an expert in deep learning, a research topic that arguably is mich closer to HN's heart. Yet HN comments on the topic are usually a bit off the mark. They feel more like something people would say after taking a 101 undergrad class in the topic, rather than a truly informed discussion. A lot of my PhD work revolved around computational biology. And while I don't work in the area anymore, i know enough about it to see that in sich a topic that's further from HNs core, comments are often not just "a bit" uninformed,but utterly so

[dhanna]

Do you study artificial intelligence?

[GhettoComputers]

I have seen this also in GWAS. I come here to talk linux and programmer stuff, politics is trash everywhere. Its a shame that any geneticist is seen as racist by the public. If you want to see a more exclusive site: https://lobste.rs/