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this post was submitted on 12 Oct 2025
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This seems like an appropriate use of it. Not as a general intelligence score (which is useless), but as a way to compare the environmental factors between 2 individuals.
I disagree. The tests might indicate differences, but we cannot conclude its "major IQ differences". Because I don't think we can calculate the IQ, because that is not a single thing. It's like trying to put into scientific numbers how much you love a person.
Note: To get the difference between 2 individuals, you need some sort of overall score for both. So you compare two useless scores to get a more useless score that only shows differences. And get a wrong conclusion about the IQ and such.
You're still talking like IQ is this absolute immutable number that a person possesses, which is how it's been used but not how it should be. It only makes sense as a comparison score. It's like how we measure temperature. We define Celsius as water freezing at 0° and boiling at 100°, but that's only true at 1 earth atmosphere of pressure. Using the same scale, the boiling point of water on Pluto is -75°
Now measuring cognition is way more complex than measuring how wiggly atoms are (which is actually also very complex), but you need to have some kind of measurement to be able to compare things and be able to say anything of scientific consequence. Not saying it's a great measurement, but we don't have many to choose from and it does tell us something. Context can absolutely change scores and the goal should be to control for that as much as possible.
Wrong. It's the exact opposite of what I'm saying. You can't measure IQ, because it is not a single number you can compress to. IQ is a complex thing. And because you cannot measure it, you can't compare two individual's differences. It makes no sense to compare.
Measuring temperature can be done exactly. If water boils here or there does not matter, the measuring act of water temperature can be done exactly. Which we cannot say about the IQ of a human, because it is not something we can measure. We have to do tests, which are obviously flawed and incomplete, and then try to guess if the test works well or not. Basically an IQ becomes an opinion, not a fact we can measure like temperature of water. Your example with the water does not apply therefore cannot be used as an argument for or against an IQ test being useful.
I'm also arguing for that being wrong. I also said that it's more complex than temperature and didn't say it was an exact measurement (temperature isn't either, just closer). The example with the temperature goes like this.
Pseudoscience says that 90 IQ is stupid and water at -20°C is frozen. Science says those numbers don't make sense out of context. -20 is a gas when there's less pressure and 90 is extraordinary when the person previously scored 50.
To resay my final point from the previous comment. If we want to study cognitive ability, we need to measure it. IQ is a messy and imprecise measurement, but it's better than nothing.
I argue having wrong measurement (or something you think can be measured and compared to another humans IQ) is worse than nothing.
There are definitely many limitations to what IQ can tell us, and it absolutely cannot be used as a universal scale, but it is repeatable and has generated accurate predictions which is what science is all about. Not as accurate as predictions using temperature, but still useful. Including studies like this demonstrating that what we think of as intelligence is more nurture than nature. We can take the information with a grain of salt, it's still information.
No. If I program a program that equates 1+1=3 in a predictable manner, and many other wrong calculations, so we don't understand its inner workings. But still the prediction would be the same with this program. That does not mean its correct. IQ tests are not good indications of if someone is more intelligent than someone else. And no, they do not generate accurate predictions, that's not even what an IQ test is for.
You're displaying an ignorance on how science works. Repeatability and predictions are massively important to the scientific method.
And you keep misunderstanding and misrepresenting what I'm saying.
And I'm not saying that IQ tells you if someone is more intelligent than someone else. (it doesn't)