IQ by country
Offline Just thought i'd share
While reading about a protest in south Africa (They were protesting that there wasn't enough trains, so they burnt some more trains... destroying them, makes sense I know) Someone posted a link to average IQ by country... which based on this behaviour im tempted to take as accurate. And I thought I would share it just so you can see how backwards your country really is... turns out the average IQ in south africa is 72.. if this is to be believed. Hong Kong has the highest with 108, USA has 98, euoprean union 99. etc.
http://knol.google.com/k/iq-by-country#
oh ya for any who are interested they attemp to draw a paralal between solar radiation and IQ.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
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well IQ average is not as high as those in Hong Kong but we are higher than Americans
yeah Canada 
Do I need to start my rant about how stupid IQ tests are? I mean, does anyone here think that human intelligence is one dimensional and that a written test can find where along that one dimension you are? Does anyone know what the Flynn effect is? IQ scores keep rising due to our education systems teaching people the skills they need to score higher. And if IQ tests are valid, that means that in the 1930's half of the population was high-functioning mentally retarded by our standards. IQ tests are not measures of innate intelligence.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
British General Charles Napier while in India
no you don't we are all aware. But that doesnt mean they are of no use.
So South Africa is borderline retarded? [retarded is below 70 IIRC]
Come on we can't judge an entire nation based on Tapey's posts
Could we do this again ommitting the Staten Island cumulative effect?
www.RichWoodsBlog.com
So the people I work with are from south africa, hmm, that explains a lot.
well what else do you call burning trains while protesting that there arent enough... borderline retarded... and
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
Can't argue with that
You know I love you
IQ is not exactly related to sunlight. But it is indirectly related to geographic altitude and tilt of Earth axis. The more is the axis tilted, the greater there are climatic changes, the environment changes, and people are forced to adapt to more extreme and unstable conditions. This is why on the northern hemisphere evolved dominant civilizations, they had more harsh life.
Beings who deserve worship don't demand it. Beings who demand worship don't deserve it.
Dude, that was so bad that you need to blow a stray dog...
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The tilt is a property of the whole earth and has changed little over the period of man's evolution, although it is the main reason why we have seasons.
You do get more seasonal variation as you get further from the equator.
You also get more variation as you get further from the sea.
I think the greatest variation is in a place like Siberia, which experiences temperature ranges of 50C, 90F.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
I doubt climate has a lot to do with IQ today, but I imagine it did long ago. If we all started in africa, as many scientists say, people moving north, running into cold weather and other adverse conditions would have had to compensate with better clothing and shelter etc, this is common sense. Nowdays with so much shared communication, it makes climate negligible as far as all this goes imo. I blame religion in good part for stupidity and if nothing else as a means to keep people stupid.
This is all just my opinion though it can also explain different races as they adjusted physically with their environment.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
I believe it has more to do with crops were domesticate as people moved into europe./asia. I dont know about this giving a better iq, but it did make lt easier to develop as the crops that came from there can be grown easier in mass than than the crops traditionally found in africa. this freed up other peoples hansd to do more than just basic looking for food.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
I didn't mean it "gave" them a better iq, but it is a pretty sound idea that when someone has to think they can learn and get teh smartz!
Edit: religion makes them think less, they have all the answers, so more religious countries in general I would think, would be teh stupidz.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Wow Luminon, that was some serious grade-A BULLSHIT right there. The harsh life of Northern Europe had NOTHING to do with civilization developing. For civilization we have plant and animal domestication to thank. Before you open your mouth (or tap on a keyboard) PLEASE go read a non-kookology book for a change. A good one describing the subject of why human's have developed the societies we have is called Guns, Germs, and Steel by Jarad Diamond. It's got it's weaknesses but overall is a great read.
"This may shock you, but not everything in the bible is true." The only true statement ever to be uttered by Jean Chauvinism, sociopathic emotional terrorist.
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"The means in which you take,
dictate the ends in which you find yourself."
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there is one basic flaw
people have been forced to think ever since they could think, there has always been problems no matter where people have been.
then if you add
it makes sense that under easier conditions humans would prosper.
europe/asia besides the temprature of some places there is for easier for humans to live, there is less disease and drought atleast back when you are talking about etc.
freeing people up from basic survival (in this case through farming) is easier is easier conditions. and harder under harder under harder conditions
when people are struggling for food they cannot develop, took humans a long time to get out of hunter gatherer stage, ever since then we have developed fast.
so
thinking + easier conditions = less concern about basic survival in there thinking = faster development
thinking + adverse conditions = more concern over basic survival in there thinking = slower development
My point is that, firstly them moving north was actually into easier conditions and that, it was these easier conditions that allowed humans to develop. Just makes sense that as people developed they got smarter. It was the crops found that allowed humans to take advantage of these conditions. Being forced to think has very little to do with it as humans have always been forced to do that.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
agreed, actually where my whole crop thing comes from, freeing up people to do other things. Agreed there are issues but it is in my top 10 of all time for shear guts trying to explain all of human history.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
So you are saying the people who remained in africa had it hard so they didn't develop much...
I think that's another thing we can't know for sure, and I would just have to disagree on it. War has caused more technological progress than anything ever has. People had to think up new ways to kill. War is recent enough in history to understand it's impact. With the "age of enlightenment" I see where you would get the idea, but I would maintain that tough times call for tough thinking ergo, progress. I very much doubt the bow and arrow were developed on a whim, someone likely thought this would make it easier to gather food and came up with the idea through critical thinking.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
by harder i mean more time spent looking for food. I agree in some cases, neccesity is the mother of invention or however it goes. Some cases not, supose it depends on weather we can actually find a solution. But in this case I am pretty much talking only about food and a few other conditions such as disease. but mainly food.
So with your war example. they are able to do that because they have been freed up from looking for food all the time.
but in the end its just guessing really. yes progress comes through problems we both agree i think, like with the bow and arrow. I just maintain those problems are easier to solve under easier conditions (not being forced to look for food all the time)
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
I also think* in part, in our early years, people may have been thinking, but they didn't have much to base idea's on. There was a point when they didn't even fully understand having sex made babies, well probably, thats an extreme example. As time progresed and more knowledge was eventually shared things began to speed up.
I have posted once before, I think we were very tribal, small tribes, there was probably a lot of conflict and due to lack of communication things progressed very very slowly. For example, I'll use the bow and arrow again. I would predict that someone and possibly many other someones could have developed the idea for the bow and arrow. Due to lack of communication this idea could simply have died with them and or their little tribe. That's just an example. Communication has had a huge role in progress, shared thought.
Thats what we are doing at this very moment, sharing thoughts. It's a learning tool.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
OK, as a psychiatric social worker, I need to say that IQ has some use. If nothing else, it helps to determine a specific need for a specific person.
That being said, the general public has a bad idea of what IQ actually is (or is good for).
In all honesty, I am not surprised that South Africa has a lower average than other nations. It is certainly uncomfortable to many but the fact is that each ethnic group has a specific average IQ. Generally, some groups will tend to be on the low end of the scale. Africans tend to not place well as a group. However, IQ has little bearing on a large groups of people.
The fact is that IQ says something about the person taking the test. Past that, some tests are better than other tests but in the end, it is always about the person.
The last secretary general of the UN was Khoif Anan (Ghana). The current guy is Ban Ki Moon (Korea). Is the Asian guy smarter than the African guy? If you could get them to both do the testing, I am sure that they would place differently but would the difference matter? Trust me on this, they are both smart motherfuckers.
=
Some IQ tests are stupid; well done fluid-IQ tests are not.
IQ tests measure a sum of several kinds of intelligence- assuming that the theory behind IQ tests claims one dimensionality is ignorance of IQ.
You can take tests with breakdowns of the different things that are being tested for.
A kinetic and responsive test can be very accurate in measuring any of the given factors. And the sum, if they are averaged for a particular purpose at hand, is very meaningful. The sum is, however, imprecise if they are taken together and used for a purpose that isn't engaged in with the same ratios of skills that the test was averaged with.
Yes, but you don't seem to.
They don't keep rising; they rise for a time, between fifteen to thirty-something points, and then mostly level off (see logarithm; it can be pushed further, but it's not easy)- and this is even in more fluid IQ tests which do measure actual intelligence, and not just learned smarts. Genetic potential intelligence is expressed to different degrees in different environments.
The Flynn effect represents populations *actually* getting smarter because they become more social and more cognitively active- the brain is very much like a muscle, and use can improve function slightly; it won't change a worm into a whale, though.
IQ is genetic and environmental, but short of brain damage, far more genetic than environmental. IQ tests measure various aspects of expressed IQ, which is the sum of potential intelligence and the variable environment it was exposed to.
The difference in IQ between populations is just barely within the potential stretch of the Flynn effect, assuming one population has not experienced it at all, and the other has experienced the greatest extent we have ever seen.
They were in respects to whatever aspects those tests in question were testing. I'm dubious of some Flynn results; I like to actually see the tests if possible, or at least learn more about their contents to comment.
Good IQ tests are a measure of expressed intelligence, which is innate intelligence augmented slightly by environment.
Some liberals get so reactionary when they see anything about race/nationality and IQ in the same place... seems a bit insecure. Maybe that wouldn't be the case if you had the facts on your side. Unfortunate position to be in; emotions conflicting with evidence.
What do you mean? I know what it is. It is real simple. IQ scores keep rising. So the tests keep getting re-normalized to make the average 100. There has been a roughly 30 point increase in the last 80ish years. That's a massive change.
I wasn't talking about an individual's IQ score rising. I was talking about how our modern education system has made the entire population's average IQ score rise. Though, the one legitimate use of IQ tests is to test a child and see if they are significantly behind their peers.
With a 30 point increase, that worm has become a whale. Or the tests aren't really testing our innate intelligence.
But in practice the environmental influence is not slight. It is massive:
Hong Kong 108
Singapore 108
Equatorial Guinea 59
A 49 point difference? Seriously? Is the average person in Equatorial Guinea actually retarded? Or does Equatorial Guinea lack the modern schooling that makes first world countries score well.
And I'm not entirely against the tests. They can be used to identify children that need special education. But when someone goes to a third world country, finds that the locals really suck at test taking and determines that they are stupid, that's not valid. And there have been problems in trying to test people who lack modern schooling. Like when Australian aborigine children were tested they all scored way too high. It was because they played string and knot games and a section of the test was to identify whether jumbles of string were actually knotted or not. One might think that the IQ test being used did not measure innate intelligence and was an aplitude test that they scored well on thanks to how well practiced they were.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
British General Charles Napier while in India
Yes, but you suggested the cause was that IQ tests are broken, neglecting that the Flynn effect actually reveals (on fluid IQ tests) that intelligence is actually increasing with good mental stimulation in formative years (and perhaps even other factors, like nutrition).
Yes, and the whole levels itself off after a time. Stimulation and practice only go so far.
More that the worm has become a weevil.
30 IQ points can do quite a bit- you are I are both probably at least 30 points above most people- but it isn't astronomical, particularly as a difference in IQ is less meaningful the higher the IQs are.
30 to 60 is pretty big. 150 to 180 is quite small.
I would need to see the tests being used to make any comments about the results of this particular study. Tests need to normalize for reading comprehension, if they don't do so, the results can be thrown.
In that case, it was. In order for an IQ test to be valid, it needs to present relatively new abstract scenarios that need to be figured out. That's hard to do, but far from impossible. Short of outliers like that, good fluid IQ tests do a good job at measuring expressed intelligence- particularly in the areas of reasoning.
No test can be perfect, but they still tell us quite a bit. Correlations with prison populations, and various countries based on general standard of living demonstrate that they are showing us something real.
I took a state funded IQ test when I was 16. I am not sure to this day what kind of test it was exactly, but somehow it determined sanity as well as IQ. I remember it asked what is the highest mountain in the world, and had multiple choice. Another question asked if I loved my parents and had a blank space for an explanation. I don't know what loving your parents has to do with IQ which is why I make the assumption it was somehow measuing sanity or maybe they were checking for autism or something, beats me. There were also puzzles I had to figure out, on a time limit.
Anyway, I don't think the test was accurate, I supposedly had an IQ of 140, I think that was wrong, I imagine I would be fairly average. So even a state funded test is not exactly a good way to determine smarts imo. A real test would need to be somehow setup for each individual.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
I saw a video on youtube about the man with the highest IQ. He is a bartender and an intelligent design proponent. When asked what he would do if he ruled the world he replied that he would remove democracy and forcibly sterilize every human on the earth. You can make what you want of that if you respect intelligence, which I do not.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
You really like Shatner eh.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Everybody likes Shatner.
He would drive humans extinct? If you sterilized everyone then you would make this the last generation. Though, I do know that there are groups that advocate human extinction. I would much rather take Frank Herbert's view: propagate mankind at all costs.
"You say that it is your custom to burn widows. Very well. We also have a custom: when men burn a woman alive, we tie a rope around their necks and we hang them. Build your funeral pyre; beside it, my carpenters will build a gallows. You may follow your custom. And then we will follow ours."
British General Charles Napier while in India
No, he would reverse it temporarily for those deemed fit, the elect if you will.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christopher_Langan
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
Raw 'intelligence' does not mean you have a good insight into any specific aspect of reality, at least without serious study, as that guy demonstrates. It also doesn't mean you can't have wacko ideas, prejudices, etc,.
It just means you are capable of analysing and understanding complex ideas.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
The "sensitive type"....
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Actually, Luminon, you don't even need to be a big fan of literature in order to 'get it'. All you need to do is dip into your history books and discover that "(civilized) intelligence" is a question of geographic features; a combination of trade, diverse neighboring cultures, mobility, and the way pre-existing technology innately modifies and enhances such phenomena. These things are almost the SOLE basis for the development of: (1) Mesopotamia (2)Egypt (3) Persia (4) Phoenicia (5) Greece (6) Indus River Valley/proto-India (7) Anyang Civilization/proto-China
These are/were important ancient cultures, and had brilliant minds associated with their foundations and general wonders. (The words "Imhotep" and "Giza" come to mind) They were also located on or about large, diverse human populations surrounded by well-traveled lands with important commercial exchanges taking place between cities/major settlements nonstop.
edit;... amazing how much a guy can retain from 6th grade history books, yes?
The general public is stupid and irrational. IQ is good for... measuring the rate at which a human mind absorbs new information?
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Apparently, your supposition falsely assumes that "study" is required for "good insight"; I didn't "study" TDS all that intensely to infer her gender. I dare suggest I made several other, particularly savvy inferences with regards to other RRS'ers, but I have no way proving many (if not most!) of the hypotheses I've made regarding RRS, and the general natures of the people posting comments on them.
Of course... there are many definitions of "study". The one you seem to be using is best applied to the Physical Sciences and little else outside of that.
If Langan's suggestion is to "wipe the slate" of Human Civilization "clean" while getting rid of Humanity's numerous and varied genetic weaknesses, he isn't invalidated simply because what he suggests makes people queasy and uncomfortable. Meritocracy is ALWAYS preferable over "the meek shall inherit the Earth". (Yeah, very true if you're talking about microbes!
)
To wit: "We shudder at the very suggestion of change."
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
Test tube babies...........
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
... on the subject matter at hand.
HOWEVER, the problem isn't "liberals", as you call it. The problem is bleeding hearts and their staunch belief in egalitarianism. All (wo)men aren't created equally. Period. Everyone should know that by now.
(I don't know if you're big on the Satanistic philosophy, BUT...)
Everyone being equal to everyone else is the ultimate sham of the 20th Century. It isn't realistic, put simply.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
True, not *all* liberals fall into this. In particular, the issue is quacks like Gardner and the like who assume equality, and then work backwards to rationalize it with poorly constructed and untestable hypotheses they go on to tout as a valid interpretation.
Very true.
I'll make no moral claims to the rightness or wrongness of this action, as it is obviously subjective (perhaps those who are weaker would be inclined to prefer this kind of support, in particular), but there is no sense denying that this is the nature of the whole 'equality' ideal.
Legal/right equality was never aptly posited as implicitly valid as a measure of human competence, but rather thought of as merely equality before the law by way of identical legal treatment- which, with glorious irony (because I suspect they derive their ideals from a corruption of this original meme), is fully contested by the equalitarians who seek special treatment for those who were born less equal than the rest of us in one way or another.