<div dir="ltr"><div class="gmail_extra"><div class="gmail_quote">On Thu, Apr 16, 2015 at 10:38 AM, Anders Sandberg <span dir="ltr"><<a href="mailto:anders@aleph.se" target="_blank">anders@aleph.se</a>></span> wrote:<br><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><div><span><span title="foozler83@gmail.com">William Flynn Wallace</span><span> <<a href="mailto:foozler83@gmail.com" target="_blank">foozler83@gmail.com</a>></span></span> , 16/4/2015 4:38 PM:<span class=""><br><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:2px blue solid;padding-left:1ex"><div style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">Don't bet the house on any three point difference in IQ. It is well within the range of error. In fact, if retested, the percentage of people whose scores would change by more than three points is very high. The standard error of measurement for the Weschler IQ test is about three. However, that is an average. In fact, as the score departs more and more from 100 the error gets greater and greater.<br><br></div><div style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0)">Three IQ points is trivial and is likely not to be the cause of anything other than test unreliability. Bill W</div></blockquote></span></div><div><br></div><div><br></div><div>You are missing the point. Individual IQ may not be that sharply defined, but that link talked about a population mean. </div><div><br></div><div>The bigger problem with the claim that a 3% increase has a huge effect is simply that extrapolating linearly far from the current mean will not work. Obviously a 10 point increase will not reduce high school drop-outs to zero: the numbers just give a bit of evidence of the sensitivity. Except that untangling causation is *tough*: these are domains where feedbacks go both ways, especially when analysing "national IQs". </div><div><br></div><div>But I think nearly all of the scientific literature supports that if something could give on average a few extra IQ points it would have a measurable positive effect. Not necessarily earth-shattering, but still significant. And the tail effects are fascinating: a small boost would increase the number of 140+ geniuses enormously, with high variance effects depending on what they do. </div><span class=""><div><br><br>Anders Sandberg, Future of Humanity Institute Philosophy Faculty of Oxford University</div></span><br><div><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:2px blue solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><div><div class="h5"><div><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><span><span style="color:#888888">
</span></span></blockquote></div></div></div></div></blockquote></div></div></blockquote><div><div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline">I did miss the point. Mea culpa. Still, three points isn't going to change much unless the standards don't change along with them. Historically, if things (IQ or whatever) get better and better, standards and expectations rise along with them, creating no real difference, except in an absolute sense.</div> <div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline"> If we added 100 points to the general population IQ, the the lowest standard would not be ability to read but to do equations in your head, or something like. I wonder what that society would be like. I'd be considered retarded.<br></div></div><blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin:0px 0px 0px 0.8ex;border-left:1px solid rgb(204,204,204);padding-left:1ex"><div><div><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:2px blue solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><div><div class="h5"><div><blockquote style="margin:0 0 0 .8ex;border-left:1px #ccc solid;padding-left:1ex"><div><div><br>
<div class="gmail_default" style="font-family:comic sans ms,sans-serif;font-size:small;color:rgb(0,0,0);display:inline">bill w</div><br>
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