army1987 comments on 2013 Survey Results - Less Wrong

74 Post author: Yvain 19 January 2014 02:51AM

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Comment author: Jiro 24 January 2014 04:05:37PM *  2 points [-]

Imagine that 1% of the population have high IQs (and will claim so) and 10% of the population are narcissistic, and half of those like to claim they have high IQ. The Bayseian calculation would be P(high IQ|claim high IQ) = P(claim high IQ|high IQ) * P(high IQ) divided by P(claim high IQ|high IQ) * P(high IQ) + P(claim high IQ|narcissism) * P(narcissism) = (1.00 * 0.01) / (1.00 * 0.01 + 0.5 * 0.10) = 1/6.

You can quibble about the exact figures, but private_messaging is correct here. Because narcissism is relatively common, the claim of having high IQ is very weak evidence for having high IQ but very strong evidence for being narcissistic. (Although it's stronger evidence for high IQ in a community where high IQ is more common.)

Comment author: [deleted] 25 January 2014 08:50:46AM 1 point [-]

You can quibble about the exact figures,

Indeed, I think you're way overestimating P(claim high IQ|high IQ).